Abstract topological data structure for 3D spatial objects

Abstract

In spatial science, the relationship between spatial objects is considered to be a vital element. Currently, 3D objects are often used for visual aids, improving human insight, spatial observations, and spatial planning. This scenario involves 3D geometrical data handling without the need for topological information. Nevertheless, in the near future, users will shift to more complex queries corresponding to the existing 2D spatial approaches. Therefore, having 3D spatial objects without having these relationships or topology is impractical for 3D spatial analysis queries. In this paper, we present a new method for creating topological information that we call the Compact Abstract Cell Complexes (CACC) data structure for 3D spatial objects. The idea is to express in the most compact way the topology of a model in 3D (or more generally in nD) without requiring the topological space to be discrete or geometric. This is achieved by storing all the atomic cycles through the models (null combinatorial homotopy classes). The main idea here is to store the atomic paths through the models as an ant experiences topology: each time the ant perceives a previous trace of pheromone, it knows it has completed a cycle. The main advantage of this combinatorial topological data structure over abstract simplicial complexes is that the storage size of the abstract cell cycles required to represent the geometric topology of a model is far lower than that for any of the existing topological data structures (including abstract simplicial cell cycles) required to represent the geometric decomposition of the same model into abstract simplicial cells. We provide a thorough comparative analysis of the storage sizes for the different topological data structures to sustain this.