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delaunay (MATLAB Functions)

MATLAB Function Reference

delaunay
Delaunay triangulation

Syntax
TRI = delaunay(x,y)

Definition
Given a set of data points, the Delaunay triangulation is a set of lines connecting each point to its natural neighbors. The Delaunay
triangulation is related to the Voronoi diagram-- the circle circumscribed about a Delaunay triangle has its center at the vertex of a Voronoi
polygon.

Description
for the data points defined by vectors x and y, returns a set of triangles such that no data points are contained in any
triangle's circumscribed circle. Each row of the m-by-3 matrix TRI defines one such triangle and contains indices into x and y. If the original
data points are collinear or x is empty, the triangles cannot be computed and delaunay returns an empty matrix.
TRI = delaunay(x,y)

Remarks
The Delaunay triangulation is used by: griddata (to interpolate scattered data), voronoi (to compute the voronoi diagram), and is useful by
itself to create a triangular grid for scattered data points.
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The functions dsearch and tsearch search the triangulation to find nearest neighbor points or enclosing triangles, respectively.

Visualization
Use one of these functions to plot the output of delaunay:
triplot

Displays the triangles defined in the m-by-3 matrix TRI. See Example 1.

trisurf

Displays each triangle defined in the m-by-3 matrix TRI as a surface in 3-D space. To see a 2-D surface, you can supply a vector
of some constant value for the third dimension. For example
trisurf(TRI,x,y,zeros(size(x)))

See Example 2.
trimesh

Displays each triangle defined in the m-by-3 matrix TRI as a mesh in 3-D space. To see a 2-D surface, you can supply a vector of
some constant value for the third dimension. For example,
trimesh(TRI,x,y,zeros(size(x)))

produces almost the same result as triplot, except in 3-D space. See Example 2.

Examples
Example 1. Plot the Delaunay triangulation for 10 randomly generated points.
rand('state',0);
x = rand(1,10);
y = rand(1,10);
TRI = delaunay(x,y);
subplot(1,2,1),...
triplot(TRI,x,y)
axis([0 1 0 1]);
hold on;
plot(x,y,'or');
hold off

Compare the Voronoi diagram of the same points:

[vx, vy] = voronoi(x,y,TRI);
subplot(1,2,2),...
plot(x,y,'r+',vx,vy,'b-'),...
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axis([0 1 0 1])

Example 2. Create a 2-D grid then use trisurf to plot its Delaunay triangulation in 3-D space by using 0s for the third dimension.
[x,y] = meshgrid(1:15,1:15);
tri = delaunay(x,y);
trisurf(tri,x,y,zeros(size(x)))

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Next, generate peaks data as a 15-by-15 matrix, and use that data with the Delaunay triangulation to produce a surface in 3-D space.
z = peaks(15);
trisurf(tri,x,y,z)

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You can use the same data with trimesh to produce a mesh in 3-D space.
trimesh(tri,x,y,z)

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delaunay (MATLAB Functions)

Algorithm
is based on Qhull . It uses the Qhull joggle option ('QJ'). For information about qhull, see
http://www.geom.umn.edu/software/qhull/. For copyright information, see http://www.geom.umn.edu/software/download/COPYING.html.
delaunay

See Also
delaunay3, delaunayn, dsearch, griddata, plot, triplot, trimesh, trisurf, tsearch, voronoi

References
[1] Barber, C. B., D.P. Dobkin, and H.T. Huhdanpaa, "The Quickhull Algorithm for Convex Hulls," ACM Transactions on Mathematical
Software, Vol. 22, No. 4, Dec. 1996, p. 469-483. Available in HTML format at http://www.acm.org/ pubs/citations/journals/toms/1996-224/p469-barber/ and in PostScript format at ftp://geom.umn.edu/pub/software/qhull-96.ps.
[2] National Science and Technology Research Center for Computation and Visualization of Geometric Structures (The Geometry Center),
University of Minnesota. 1993.
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del2

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delaunay (MATLAB Functions)

delaunay3

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