Basic Computational Topology:

SM 402

Amit Chattopadhyay

IIIT-Bangalore

Ch 0: Overview

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 Syllabus: Outline

Basic Computational Topology

1. Topological Spaces

2. Surfaces

3. Complexes

4. Simplicial Homology

5. Morse Theory

6. Persistent Homology

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 Reference Books

1. Basic Topology: M. A. Armstrong.

2. Topology: James R. Munkres
3. Computational Topology: An Introduction, Herbert
Edelsbrunner, John Harer, AMS, 2010.
4. Effective Computational Geometry for Curves and Surfaces, Ch
7: Computational Topology: An Introduction, Günter Rote and Gert
Vegter

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 Overview

• What is ‘Topology’?

• Why do we require Computation (Algorithms)?

• Where are the potential applications?

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 Topology

• Branch of Mathematics - Systematic study of shapes

• Shapes - Topological Spaces
• Goal - Classification of shapes using global properties (e.g.
connectivity, holes of different dimensions)
• Topological Equivalence: Homeomorphism, Isotopy, Homotopy,
Homology

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Topological Equivalence: Examples

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Topological Equivalence: Examples

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Topological Spaces: Examples

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 Topological Spaces: Examples

• 1D: Curves

• 2D: Surfaces

• nD: Manifolds

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 Classification Theorem

Any orientable closed surface is homeomorphic either to the sphere, or to

the sphere with a finite number of handles added.

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 How to Distinguish Topological Spaces?: Invariants

• Properties of a topological space that remain invariant under

homeomorphism - Connectedness, Euler characteristics,
Homology groups etc.
• Useful to show two topological spaces are not equivalent

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 Computational Topology

• Solving algorithmic problems in topology

• Problem: Are the black dots connected?

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 Problem: Parity

• Problem: Inside or outside the region enclosed by the polygon?

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 Problem: Equivalent Knots

• Problem: Algorithm to check whether two knots are equivalent or

not

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 Problem: Graph Embedding in Plane

• Problem: Algorithm to compute a planar embedding of a graph, if

exists

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 Surfaces: Algorithms

• Searching a triangulation of a surface

• Computing Euler characteristic of a surface
• Checking Orientability of a surfaces
• Computing genus and topological type of a surface
• Checking Crossings
• Simplification of surfaces

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 Complexes: Representing topological spaces

• Simplicial Complex
• Convex set systems
• Delaunay Complexes
• Alpha Complexes

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 Computational Topology: Tools for Data Analysis

• Simplicial Homology: Counting Holes in the data

• Morse Theory: Study of “Critical Features”

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 Computational Topology: Tools for Data Analysis

• Persistent Homology: Study of "Births" and "Deaths" of holes

• Topological Skeletons: for Scalar and Vector Data

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 Applications

• Persistence based Image segmentation

• Measures of Gene Expression Data

• Elevation for Protein Docking

• Homology for Root Architectures

• Molecular shape matching for drug design

• From Chemical Topology to Molecular Machines (Nobel Prize in

Computational Chemistry, 2017)

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 Summary

• Topology: A branch of mathematics for the systematic study of

shapes based on global properties (holes)
• Computational Topology: Algorithmic problems in topology (e.g.
Counting holes of different dimensions in a topological space)
• Applications: Data+Topology = Shape of the Data

• Applications: Topological Data Analysis, Topological Machine

Learning.

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