Multivariate Splines and Algebraic Geometry

Multivariate splines are effective tools in numerical analysis and approximation theory. Despite an extensive literature on the subject, there remain open questions in finding their dimension, constructing local bases, and determining their approximation power. Much of what is currently known was developed by numerical analysts, using classical methods, in particular the so-called Bernstein-B´ezier techniques. Due to their many interesting structural properties, splines have become of keen interest to researchers in commutative and homological algebra and algebraic geometry. Unfortunately, these communities have not collaborated much. The purpose of the half-size workshop is to intensify the interaction between the different groups by bringing them together. This could lead to essential breakthroughs on several of the above problems

Interrogation of spline surfaces with application to isogeometric design and analysis of lattice-skin structures

A novel surface interrogation technique is proposed to compute the intersection of curves with spline surfaces in isogeometric analysis. The intersection points are determined in one-shot without resorting to a Newton-Raphson iteration or successive refinement. Surface-curve intersection is required in a wide range of applications, including contact, immersed boundary methods and lattice-skin structures, and requires usually the solution of a system of nonlinear equations. It is assumed that the surface is given in form of a spline, such as a NURBS, T-spline or Catmull-Clark subdivision surface, and is convertible into a collection of B\'ezier patches. First, a hierarchical bounding volume tree is used to efficiently identify the B\'ezier patches with a convex-hull intersecting the convex-hull of a given curve segment. For ease of implementation convex-hulls are approximated with k-dops (discrete orientation polytopes). Subsequently, the intersections of the identified B\'ezier patches with the curve segment are determined with a matrix-based implicit representation leading to the computation of a sequence of small singular value decompositions (SVDs). As an application of the developed interrogation technique the isogeometric design and analysis of lattice-skin structures is investigated. The skin is a spline surface that is usually created in a computer-aided design (CAD) system and the periodic lattice to be fitted consists of unit cells, each containing a small number of struts. The lattice-skin structure is generated by projecting selected lattice nodes onto the surface after determining the intersection of unit cell edges with the surface. For mechanical analysis, the skin is modelled as a Kirchhoff-Love thin-shell and the lattice as a pin-jointed truss. The two types of structures are coupled with a standard Lagrange multiplier approach

Gaussian quadrature for C1C^1 cubic Clough-Tocher macro-triangles

A numerical integration rule for multivariate cubic polynomials over n-dimensional simplices was designed by Hammer and Stroud [14]. The quadrature rule requires n + 2 quadrature points: the barycentre of the simplex and n + 1 points that lie on the connecting lines between the barycentre and the vertices of the simplex. In the planar case, this particular rule belongs to a two-parameter family of quadrature rules that admit exact integration of bivariate polynomials of total degree three over triangles. We prove that this rule is exact for a larger space, namely the C1 cubic Clough-Tocher spline space over macro-triangles if and only if the split-point is the barycentre. This results into a factor of three reduction in the number of quadrature points needed to integrate the Clough-Tocher spline space exactly

Algebraic Methods for Dynamical Systems and Optimisation

This thesis develops various aspects of Algebraic Geometry and its applications in different fields of science. In Chapter 2 we characterise the feasible set of an optimisation problem relevant in chemical process engineering. We consider the polynomial dynamical system associated with mass-action kinetics of a chemical reaction network. Given an initial point, the attainable region of that point is the smallest convex and forward closed set that contains the trajectory. We show that this region is a spectrahedral shadow for a class of linear dynamical systems. As a step towards representing attainable regions we develop algorithms to compute the convex hulls of trajectories. We present an implementation of this algorithm which works in dimensions 2,3 and 4. These algorithms are based on a theory that approximates the boundary of the convex hull of curves by a family of polytopes. If the convex hull is represented as the output of our algorithms we can also check whether it is forward closed or not. Chapter 3 has two parts. In this first part, we do a case study of planar curves of degree 6. It is known that there are 64 rigid isotopy types of these curves. We construct explicit polynomial representatives with integer coefficients for each of these types using different techniques in the literature. We present an algorithm, and its implementation in software Mathematica, for determining the isotopy type of a given sextic. Using the representatives various sextics for each type were sampled. On those samples we explored the number of real bitangents, inflection points and eigenvectors. We also computed the tensor rank of the representatives by numerical methods. We show that the locus of all real lines that do not meet a given sextic is a union of up to 46 convex regions that is bounded by its dual curve. In the second part of Chapter 3 we consider a problem arising in molecular biology. In a system where molecules bind to a target molecule with multiple binding sites, cooperativity measures how the already bound molecules affect the chances of other molecules binding. We address an optimisation problem that arises while quantifying cooperativity. We compute cooperativity for the real data of molecules binding to hemoglobin and its variants. In Chapter 4, given a variety X in n-dimensional projective space we look at its image under the map that takes each point in X to its coordinate-wise r-th power. We compute the degree of the image. We also study their defining equations, particularly for hypersurfaces and linear spaces. We exhibit the set-theoretic equations of the coordinate-wise square of a linear space L of dimension k embedded in a high dimensional ambient space. We also establish a link between coordinate-wise squares of linear spaces and the study of real symmetric matrices with degenerate eigenspectrum

Ray Tracing Methods for Point Cloud Rendering

State of the art scanning and capturing devices are able to produce surface point cloud models of a wide range of real world objects. The visualization and rendering of enormous point clouds with millions or billions of points is demanding. VR- and AR-applications can utilize embedded real world objects in generating visually pleasing and immersive virtual worlds. In order to achieve convincing real life equivalents in VR, rendering techniques that can replicate realistic material and lighting effects are needed. This can be achieved by utilizing ray tracing methods to render the virtual world onto a monitor or a head-mounted display. Virtual reality applications need real-time stereoscopic rendering with high frame rates and resolution to produce a realistic and comfortable experience. This sets high demands on a point cloud ray tracing pipeline, which needs efficient intersection testing between rays and point cloud models. An easily intersectable global surface can be reconstructed from the point cloud model with, e.g., triangle mesh reconstruction. However, this can be computationally demanding and even wasteful if parts of the model are out of view or occluded. Direct point cloud ray tracing methods consider local features of the point cloud to generate intersectable surfaces only when needed. In this thesis, we survey and compare different methods for directly ray tracing point cloud models without global surface reconstruction. Methods are compared with asymptotic complexity analysis and it is concluded that direct ray tracing of point clouds can be computationally more efficient compared to global surface reconstruction

Conversion of B-rep CAD models into globally G¹ triangular splines

Existing techniques that convert B-rep (boundary representation) patches into Clough-Tocher splines guarantee watertight, that is C0, conversion results across B-rep edges. In contrast, our approach ensures global tangent-plane, that is G1, continuity of the converted B-rep CAD models. We achieve this by careful boundary curve and normal vector management, and by converting the input models into Shirman-Séquin macro-elements near their (trimmed) B-rep edges. We propose several different variants and compare them with respect to their locality, visual quality, and difference with the input B-rep CAD model. Although the same global G1 continuity can also be achieved by conversion techniques based on subdivision surfaces, our approach uses triangular splines and thus enjoys full compatibility with CAD

Robust Surface Reconstruction from Point Clouds

The problem of generating a surface triangulation from a set of points with normal information arises in several mesh processing tasks like surface reconstruction or surface resampling. In this paper we present a surface triangulation approach which is based on local 2d delaunay triangulations in tangent space. Our contribution is the extension of this method to surfaces with sharp corners and creases. We demonstrate the robustness of the method on difficult meshing problems that include nearby sheets, self intersecting non manifold surfaces and noisy point samples