Reconstruction of polycrystalline structures: a new application of combinatorial optimization (Q1086259)

Many known materials possess polycrystalline structure. The images produced by plane cuts through such structures are polygonal complexes. The problem of finding the edges, when only the vertices of a given polygonal complex are known, is considered. A combinatorial optimization model is proposed whose solution yields an approximation of the complex. The problem itself is solved using simulated annealing. Encouraging first experiments are presented.