1,171 research outputs found
Computational Geometry Column 42
A compendium of thirty previously published open problems in computational
geometry is presented.Comment: 7 pages; 72 reference
Minimum-weight triangulation is NP-hard
A triangulation of a planar point set S is a maximal plane straight-line
graph with vertex set S. In the minimum-weight triangulation (MWT) problem, we
are looking for a triangulation of a given point set that minimizes the sum of
the edge lengths. We prove that the decision version of this problem is
NP-hard. We use a reduction from PLANAR-1-IN-3-SAT. The correct working of the
gadgets is established with computer assistance, using dynamic programming on
polygonal faces, as well as the beta-skeleton heuristic to certify that certain
edges belong to the minimum-weight triangulation.Comment: 45 pages (including a technical appendix of 13 pages), 28 figures.
This revision contains a few improvements in the expositio
Aspects of Unstructured Grids and Finite-Volume Solvers for the Euler and Navier-Stokes Equations
One of the major achievements in engineering science has been the development of computer algorithms for solving nonlinear differential equations such as the Navier-Stokes equations. In the past, limited computer resources have motivated the development of efficient numerical schemes in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) utilizing structured meshes. The use of structured meshes greatly simplifies the implementation of CFD algorithms on conventional computers. Unstructured grids on the other hand offer an alternative to modeling complex geometries. Unstructured meshes have irregular connectivity and usually contain combinations of triangles, quadrilaterals, tetrahedra, and hexahedra. The generation and use of unstructured grids poses new challenges in CFD. The purpose of this note is to present recent developments in the unstructured grid generation and flow solution technology
Minimizing the stabbing number of matchings, trees, and triangulations
The (axis-parallel) stabbing number of a given set of line segments is the
maximum number of segments that can be intersected by any one (axis-parallel)
line. This paper deals with finding perfect matchings, spanning trees, or
triangulations of minimum stabbing number for a given set of points. The
complexity of these problems has been a long-standing open question; in fact,
it is one of the original 30 outstanding open problems in computational
geometry on the list by Demaine, Mitchell, and O'Rourke. The answer we provide
is negative for a number of minimum stabbing problems by showing them NP-hard
by means of a general proof technique. It implies non-trivial lower bounds on
the approximability. On the positive side we propose a cut-based integer
programming formulation for minimizing the stabbing number of matchings and
spanning trees. We obtain lower bounds (in polynomial time) from the
corresponding linear programming relaxations, and show that an optimal
fractional solution always contains an edge of at least constant weight. This
result constitutes a crucial step towards a constant-factor approximation via
an iterated rounding scheme. In computational experiments we demonstrate that
our approach allows for actually solving problems with up to several hundred
points optimally or near-optimally.Comment: 25 pages, 12 figures, Latex. To appear in "Discrete and Computational
Geometry". Previous version (extended abstract) appears in SODA 2004, pp.
430-43
Optimal Point Placement for Mesh Smoothing
We study the problem of moving a vertex in an unstructured mesh of
triangular, quadrilateral, or tetrahedral elements to optimize the shapes of
adjacent elements. We show that many such problems can be solved in linear time
using generalized linear programming. We also give efficient algorithms for
some mesh smoothing problems that do not fit into the generalized linear
programming paradigm.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures. A preliminary version of this paper was
presented at the 8th ACM/SIAM Symp. on Discrete Algorithms (SODA '97). This
is the final version, and will appear in a special issue of J. Algorithms for
papers from SODA '9
Approximating Loops in a Shortest Homology Basis from Point Data
Inference of topological and geometric attributes of a hidden manifold from
its point data is a fundamental problem arising in many scientific studies and
engineering applications. In this paper we present an algorithm to compute a
set of loops from a point data that presumably sample a smooth manifold
. These loops approximate a {\em shortest} basis of the
one dimensional homology group over coefficients in finite field
. Previous results addressed the issue of computing the rank of
the homology groups from point data, but there is no result on approximating
the shortest basis of a manifold from its point sample. In arriving our result,
we also present a polynomial time algorithm for computing a shortest basis of
for any finite {\em simplicial complex} whose edges have
non-negative weights
Morphing of Triangular Meshes in Shape Space
We present a novel approach to morph between two isometric poses of the same
non-rigid object given as triangular meshes. We model the morphs as linear
interpolations in a suitable shape space . For triangulated 3D
polygons, we prove that interpolating linearly in this shape space corresponds
to the most isometric morph in . We then extend this shape space
to arbitrary triangulations in 3D using a heuristic approach and show the
practical use of the approach using experiments. Furthermore, we discuss a
modified shape space that is useful for isometric skeleton morphing. All of the
newly presented approaches solve the morphing problem without the need to solve
a minimization problem.Comment: Improved experimental result
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