We survey results in geometric network design theory, including algorithms for constructing minimum spanning trees and low-dilation graphs. 1 Introduction This survey covers topics in geometric network design theory. The problem is easy to state: connect a collection of sites by a "good" network. For instance, one may wish to connect components of a VLSI circuit by networks of wires, in a way that uses little surface area on the chip, draws little power, and propagates signals quickly. Similar problems come up in other applications such as telecommunications, road network design, and medical imaging [1]. One network design problem, the Traveling Salesman problem, is sufficiently important to have whole books devoted to it [79]. Problems involving some form of geometric minimum or maximum spanning tree also arise in the solution of other geometric problems such as clustering [12], mesh generation [56], and robot motion planning [93]. One can vary the network design problem in many w...

We review the recent progress in the design of efficient algorithms for various problems in geometric optimization. We present several techniques used to attack these problems, such as parametric searching, geometric alternatives to parametric searching, prune-and-search techniques for linear programming and related problems, and LPtype problems and their efficient solution. We then describe a variety of applications of these and other techniques to numerous problems in geometric optimization, including facility location, proximity problems, statistical estimators and metrology, placement and intersection of polygons and polyhedra, and ray shooting and other query-type problems.

This is the preliminary version of a chapter that will appear in the Handbook on Computational Geometry, edited by J.-R. Sack and J. Urrutia. A comprehensive overview is given of algorithms and data structures for proximity problems on point sets in IR D . In particular, the closest pair problem, the exact and approximate post-office problem, and the problem of constructing spanners are discussed in detail. Contents 1 Introduction 1 2 The static closest pair problem 4 2.1 Preliminary remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 2.2 Algorithms that are optimal in the algebraic computation tree model . 5 2.2.1 An algorithm based on the Voronoi diagram . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2.2.2 A divide-and-conquer algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2.2.3 A plane sweep algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 2.3 A deterministic algorithm that uses indirect addressing . . . . . . . . . 7 2.3.1 The degraded grid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...

Weintroduce a new method for finding several types of optimal k-point sets, minimizing perimeter, diameter, circumradius, and related measures, by testing sets of the O(k) nearest neighbors to each point. We argue that this is better in a number of ways than previous algorithms, whichwere based on high order Voronoi diagrams. Our technique allows us for the first time to efficiently maintain minimal sets as new points are inserted, to generalize our algorithms to higher dimensions, to find minimal convex k-vertex polygons and polytopes, and to improvemany previous results. Weachievemany of our results via a new algorithm for finding rectilinear nearest neighbors in the plane in time O(n log n+kn). We also demonstrate a related technique for finding minimum area k-point sets in the plane, based on testing sets of nearest vertical neighbors to each line segment determined by a pair of points. A generalization of this technique also allows us to find minimum volume and boundary measure sets in arbitrary dimensions.

We propose a simple, general, randomized technique to reduce certain geometric optimization problems to their corresponding decision problems. These reductions increase the expected time complexity by only a constant factor and eliminate extra logarithmic factors in previous, often more complicated, deterministic approaches (such as parametric searching). Faster algorithms are thus obtained for a variety of problems in computational geometry: finding minimal k-point subsets, matching point sets under translation, computing rectilinear p-centers and discrete 1centers, and solving linear programs with k violations. 1 Introduction Consider the classic randomized algorithm for finding the minimum of r numbers minfA[1]; : : : ; A[r]g: Algorithm rand-min 1. randomly pick a permutation hi 1 ; : : : ; i r i of h1; : : : ; ri 2. t /1 3. for k = 1; : : : ; r do 4. if A[i k ] ! t then 5. t / A[i k ] 6. return t By a well-known fact [27, 44], the expected number of times that step 5 is execut...

Two decades ago, Megiddo and Dyer showed that linear programming in 2 and 3 dimensions (and subsequently, any constant number of dimensions) can be solved in linear time. In this paper, we consider linear programming with at most k violations: finding a point inside all but at most k of n given halfspaces. We give a simple algorithm in 2-d that runs in O((n + k ) log n) expected time; this is faster than earlier algorithms by Everett, Robert, and van Kreveld (1993) and Matousek (1994) and is probably nearoptimal for all k n=2. A (theoretical) extension of our algorithm in 3-d runs in near O(n + k ) expected time. Interestingly, the idea is based on concave-chain decompositions (or covers) of the ( k)-level, previously used in proving combinatorial k-level bounds.

We maintain the minimum spanning tree of a point set in the plane, subject to point insertions and deletions, in amortized time O(n 1/2 log 2 n) per update operation. We reduce the problem to maintaining bichromatic closest pairs, which we solve in time O(n # ) per update. Our algorithm uses a novel construction, the ordered nearest neighbor path of a set of points. Our results generalize to higher dimensions, and to fully dynamic algorithms for maintaining minima of binary functions, including the diameter of a point set and the bichromatic farthest pair. 1 Introduction A dynamic geometric data structure is one that maintains the solution to some problem, defined on a geometric input such as a point set, as the input undergoes update operations such as insertions or deletions of single points. Dynamic algorithms have been studied for many geometric optimization problems, including closest pairs [7, 23, 25, 26], diameter [7, 26], width [4], convex hulls [15, 22], linear ...

Map labeling is of fundamental importance in cartography and geographical information systems and is one of the areas targeted for research by the ACM Computational Geometry Impact Task Force. Previous work on map labeling has focused on the problem of placing maximal uniform, axis-aligned, disjoint rectangles on the plane so that each point feature to be labeled lies at the corner of one rectangle. Here, we consider a number of variants of the map labeling problem. We obtain three general types of results. First, we devise constant-factor polynomial-time approximation algorithms for labeling point features by rectangular labels, where the feature may lie anywhere on the boundary of its label region and where labeling rectangles may be placed in any orientation. These results generalize to the case of elliptical labels. Secondly, we consider the problem of labeling a map consisting of disjoint rectilinear line segments. We obtain constant-factor polynomial-time approximation algorithms for the general problem and an optimal algorithm for the special case where all segments are horizontal. Finally, we formulate a bicriteria version of the map-labeling problem and provide bicriteria polynomial-time approximation schemes for a number of such problems.

Let Xn = fx 1 ; : : : ; xn g, be an i.i.d. sample having multivariate distribution P . We derive a.s. limits for the power weighted edge weight function of greedy approximations to a class of minimal graphs spanning k of the n samples. The class includes minimal k-point graphs constructed by the partitioning method of Ravi, Sundaram, Marathe, Rosenkrantz and Ravi [43] where the edge weight function satises the quasi-additive property of Redmond and Yukich [45]. In particular this includes greedy approximations to the k-point minimal spanning tree (k-MST), Steiner tree (k-ST), and the traveling salesman problem (k-TSP). An expression for the inuence function of the minimal weight function is given which characterizes the asymptotic sensitivity of the graph weight to perturbations in the underlying distribution. The inuence function takes a form which indicates that the k-point minimal graph in d > 1 dimensions has robustness properties in IR d which are analogous to those of rank order statistics in one dimension. A direct result of our theory is that the log-weight of the k-point minimal graph is a consistent nonparametric estimate of the Renyi entropy of the distribution P . Possible applications of this work include: analysis of random communication network topologies, estimation of the mixing coecient in -contaminated mixture models, outlier discrimination and rejection, clustering and pattern recognition, robust non-parametric regression, two sample matching and image registration.

we present an algorithm that "-approximates the extent between the top and bottom k levels of the arrangement of H in time O(n+(k=") ), where c is a constant depending on d. The algorithm relies on computing a subset of H of size O(k=" ), in near linear time, such that the k-level of the arrangement of the subset approximates that of the original arrangement. Using this algorithm, we propose ecient approximation algorithms for shape tting with outliers for various shapes. This is the rst algorithms to handle outliers eciently for the shape tting problems considered.