The complexity of the normal surface solution space

DOI10.1145/1810959.1810995zbMATH Open1284.68586arXiv0911.5498OpenAlexW2006640074MaRDI QIDQ5405883FDOQ5405883

Authors: Benjamin A. Burton 

Publication date: 3 April 2014

Published in: Proceedings of the twenty-sixth annual symposium on Computational geometry (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: Normal surface theory is a central tool in algorithmic three-dimensional topology, and the enumeration of vertex normal surfaces is the computational bottleneck in many important algorithms. However, it is not well understood how the number of such surfaces grows in relation to the size of the underlying triangulation. Here we address this problem in both theory and practice. In theory, we tighten the exponential upper bound substantially; furthermore, we construct pathological triangulations that prove an exponential bound to be unavoidable. In practice, we undertake a comprehensive analysis of millions of triangulations and find that in general the number of vertex normal surfaces is remarkably small, with strong evidence that our pathological triangulations may in fact be the worst case scenarios. This analysis is the first of its kind, and the striking behaviour that we observe has important implications for the feasibility of topological algorithms in three dimensions.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/0911.5498

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zbMATH Keywords

complexitycomputational topology3-manifoldsvertex enumerationnormal surfaces

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Analysis of algorithms and problem complexity (68Q25) Computational difficulty of problems (lower bounds, completeness, difficulty of approximation, etc.) (68Q17) Computer graphics; computational geometry (digital and algorithmic aspects) (68U05) Geometric constructions in real or complex geometry (51M15) Triangulating manifolds (57Q15) Topological manifolds (57N99)

Cited In (11)

• The Weber-Seifert dodecahedral space is non-Haken
• Optimizing the double description method for normal surface enumeration
• Tracing compressed curves in triangulated surfaces
• On the complexity of immersed normal surfaces
• Computational topology and normal surfaces: theoretical and experimental complexity bounds
• Converting between quadrilateral and standard solution sets in normal surface theory
• Quadrilateral–Octagon Coordinates for Almost Normal Surfaces
• The computational complexity of classical knot recognition
• Maximal admissible faces and asymptotic bounds for the normal surface solution space
• Why happy instead of just normal?
• Core curves of triangulated solid tori

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