Topologically Clean Distance Fields

A.G. GYULASSY; M.A. DUCHAINEAU; V. NATARAJAN; V. PASCUCCI; E.M. BRINGA

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON VISUALIZATION AND COMPUTER GRAPHICS

IEEE COMPUTER SOC

Año: 2007 vol. 3 p. 1432 - 1439

1077-2626

Analysis of the results obtained from material simulations is important in the physical sciences. Our research was motivated by theneed to investigate the properties of a simulated porous solid as it is hit by a projectile. This paper describes two techniques forthe generation of distance fields containing a minimal number of topological features, and we use them to identify features of thematerial. We focus on distance fields defined on a volumetric domain considering the distance to a given surface embedded withinthe domain. Topological features of the field are characterized by its critical points. Our first method begins with a distance fieldthat is computed using a standard approach, and simplifies this field using ideas from Morse theory. We present a procedure foridentifying and extracting a feature set through analysis of the MS complex, and apply it to find the invariants in the clean distancefield. Our second method proceeds by advancing a front, beginning at the surface, and locally controlling the creation of new criticalpoints. We demonstrate the value of topologically clean distance fields for the analysis of filament structures in porous solids. Ourmethods produce a curved skeleton representation of the filaments that helps material scientists to perform a detailed qualitative andquantitative analysis of pores, and hence infer important material properties. Furthermore, we provide a set of criteria for findingthe "difference" between two skeletal structures, and use this to examine how the structure of the porous solid changes over severaltimesteps in the simulation of the particle impact.