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2014 | Buch

A Short Course in Computational Geometry and Topology

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This monograph presents a short course in computational geometry and topology. In the first part the book covers Voronoi diagrams and Delaunay triangulations, then it presents the theory of alpha complexes which play a crucial role in biology. The central part of the book is the homology theory and their computation, including the theory of persistence which is indispensable for applications, e.g. shape reconstruction. The target audience comprises researchers and practitioners in mathematics, biology, neuroscience and computer science, but the book may also be beneficial to graduate students of these fields.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Frontmatter
Chapter 1. Roots of Geometry and Topology
Abstract
Geometric questions have been pondered by people for thousands of years.
Herbert Edelsbrunner

Tessellations

Frontmatter
Chapter 2. Voronoi and Delaunay Diagrams
Abstract
The goal of this book is the introduction of the Voronoi diagram and the Delaunay triangulation of a finite set of points in the plane, and an elucidation of their dual relationship.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 3. Weighted Diagrams
Abstract
Every region in a 2-dimensional Voronoi diagram consists of all points for which the corresponding site minimizes the Euclidean distance.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 4. Three Dimensions
Abstract
Voronoi diagrams and Delaunay triangulations in \({{\mathbb R}}^3\) are more interesting and more difficult to understand than in \({{\mathbb R}}^2\). In this section, we develop some intuition by considering these tessellations for a few symmetric point sets.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Backmatter

Complexes

Frontmatter
Chapter 5. Alpha Complexes
Abstract
The original motivation for the concept of alpha shapes was the desire to develop a concrete version of the intuitive notion of ‘shape’ of a finite point set. Starting from this idea, we explore connections to Voronoi diagrams and Delaunay triangulations.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 6. Holes
Abstract
Being possibly non-convex, alpha shapes can have many interesting features, some of which that are best classified as types of holes. We begin with the easy 2-dimensional case, noting that the types and structure of holes gets progressively more complicated as the dimension increases.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 7. Area Formulas
Abstract
Perhaps surprisingly, \(\alpha \)-complexes are useful in measuring a union of balls in two and higher dimensions.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Backmatter

Homology

Frontmatter
Chapter 8. Topological Spaces
Abstract
In geometry, we can decide which points are near and which are far by computing distance. In topology, no such notion is available and distance is replaced by the weaker concept of neighborhoods.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 9. Homology Groups
Abstract
Given a topological space, its homology is a formal, algebraic way to talk about its connectivity. Better known than the homology groups are their ranks,which are the Betti numbers of the space.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 10. Complex Construction
Abstract
There are not many ways to automatically construct interesting topological spaces, and by ‘interesting’ we mean spaces that go beyond the designed ones, such as the ball, and the sphere.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Backmatter

Persistence

Frontmatter
Chapter 11. Filtrations
Abstract
Complicated shapes and data sets—in particular those that occur in nature—have different appearance depending on the resolution of the observation.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 12. PL Functions
Abstract
Other than from alpha, Čech, and Vietoris-Rips complexes, we get filtrations from real-valued functions on topological spaces.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Chapter 13. Matrix Reduction
Abstract
We have seen how mathematical reasoning can be used to compute persistent homology for simple filtrations.
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Backmatter
Backmatter
Metadaten
Titel
A Short Course in Computational Geometry and Topology
verfasst von
Herbert Edelsbrunner
Copyright-Jahr
2014
Electronic ISBN
978-3-319-05957-0
Print ISBN
978-3-319-05956-3
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05957-0