Constructive Polynomial Partitioning for Algebraic Curves in R3\mathbb{R}^3 with Applications

In 2015, Guth proved that for any set of $k$-dimensional bounded complexity varieties in $\mathbb{R}^d$ and for any positive integer $D$, there exists a polynomial of degree at most $D$ whose zero set divides $\mathbb{R}^d$ into open connected sets, so that only a small fraction of the given varieties intersect each of these sets. Guth's result generalized an earlier result of Guth and Katz for points. Guth's proof relies on a variant of the Borsuk-Ulam theorem, and for $k>0$, it is unknown how to obtain an explicit representation of such a partitioning polynomial and how to construct it efficiently. In particular, it is unknown how to effectively construct such a polynomial for bounded-degree algebraic curves (or even lines) in $\mathbb{R}^3$. We present an efficient algorithmic construction for this setting. Given a set of $n$ input algebraic curves and a positive integer $D$, we efficiently construct a decomposition of space into $O(D^3\log^3{D})$ open "cells," each of which meets $O(n/D^2)$ curves from the input. The construction time is $O(n^2)$. For the case of lines in $3$-space we present an improved implementation, whose running time is $O(n^{4/3} \log^{O(1)} n)$. The constant of proportionality in both time bounds depends on $D$ and the maximum degree of the polynomials defining the input curves. As an application, we revisit the problem of eliminating depth cycles among non-vertical lines in $3$-space, recently studied by Aronov and Sharir (2018), and show an algorithm that cuts $n$ such lines into $O(n^{3/2+\epsilon})$ pieces that are depth-cycle free, for any $\epsilon > 0$. The algorithm runs in $O(n^{3/2+\epsilon})$ time, which is a considerable improvement over the previously known algorithms.Comment: 20 pages, 0 figures. v2: final version, to appear in SIAM J. Comput. A preliminary version of this work was presented in Proc. 30th Annual ACM-SIAM Sympos. Discrete Algorithms, 201

Eliminating Depth Cycles among Triangles in Three Dimensions

Given $n$ pairwise openly disjoint triangles in 3-space, their vertical depth relation may contain cycles. We show that, for any $\varepsilon>0$, the triangles can be cut into $O(n^{3/2+\varepsilon})$ connected semi-algebraic pieces, whose description complexity depends only on the choice of $\varepsilon$, such that the depth relation among these pieces is now a proper partial order. This bound is nearly tight in the worst case. We are not aware of any previous study of this problem, in this full generality, with a subquadratic bound on the number of pieces. This work extends the recent study by two of the authors (Aronov, Sharir~2018) on eliminating depth cycles among lines in 3-space. Our approach is again algebraic, and makes use of a recent variant of the polynomial partitioning technique, due to Guth, which leads to a recursive procedure for cutting the triangles. In contrast to the case of lines, our analysis here is considerably more involved, due to the two-dimensional nature of the objects being cut, so additional tools, from topology and algebra, need to be brought to bear. Our result essentially settles a 35-year-old open problem in computational geometry, motivated by hidden-surface removal in computer graphics.Comment: 28 pages, 4 figure