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Abstract:
We consider the problem of computing the largest
region in a terrain that is approximately contained in some
two-dimensional plane. We reduce this problem to the
following one. Given an embedding of a degree-3 graph $G$ on the
unit sphere $\IS^2$, whose vertices are weighted, compute a
connected subgraph of maximum weight that is contained in some
spherical disk of a fixed radius. We give an algorithm that solves
this problem in $O(n^2 \log n (\log\log n)^3)$ time, where $n$
denotes the number of vertices of $G$ or, alternatively, the number
of faces of the terrain. We also give a heuristic that can be used to
compute sufficiently large regions in a terrain that are approximately
planar. We discuss an implementation of this heuristic, and show some
experimental results for terrains representing three-dimensional
(topographical) images of fracture surfaces of metals obtained by
confocal laser scanning microscopy.
