Yes / Given a prescribed boundary of a Bezier surface we compare the Bezier surfaces generated by two different methods, i.e. the Bezier surface minimising the Biharmonic functional and the unique Bezier surface solution of the Biharmonic equation with prescribed boundary. Although often the two types of surfaces look visually the same, we show that they are indeed different. In this paper we provide a theoretical argument showing why the two types of surfaces are not always the same.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 1997. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 63-64). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 1997. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 63-64). Also available on the Internet.

Yes / The prevalence of micromoulded components has steadily increased over recent years. The production of such components is extremely sensitive to a number of variables that may potentially lead to significant changes in the surface geometry, often regarded as a crucial determinant of the product¿s functionality and quality. So far, traditional large-scale quality assessment techniques have been used in micromoulding. However, these techniques are not entirely suitable for small scales . Techniques such as Atomic Force Mi- croscopy (AFM) or White Light Interferometry (WLI) have been used for obtaining full three-dimensional profiles of micromoulded components, pro- ducing large data sets that are very difficult to manage. This work presents a method of characterizing surface features of micro and nano scale based on the use of the Biharmonic equation as means of describing surface profiles whilst guaranteeing tangential (C1) continuity. Thus, the problem of rep- resenting surface features of micromoulded components from massive point clouds is transformed into a boundary-value problem, reducing the amount of data required to describe any given surface feature.The boundary conditions needed for finding a particular solution to the Biharmonic equation are extracted from the data set and the coefficients associated with a suitable analytic solution are used to describe key design parameters or geometric properties of a surface feature. Moreover, the expressions found for describ- ing key design parameters in terms of the analytic solution to the Biharmonic equation may lead to a more suitable quality assessment technique for mi- cromoulding than the criteria currently used. In summary this technique provides a means for compressing point clouds representing surface features whilst providing an analytic description of such features. The work is applicable to many other instances where surface topography is in need of efficient representation.

Thesis (M.S.)--West Virginia University, 1999. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains iv, 87 p. : ill. (some col.). Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 86-87).

Thesis (doctoral)--Rheinischen Friedrich-Wilhelm Universität, Bonn, 1981. / Bibliography: p. 78-87.

no / The prevalence of micromoulded components has steadily increased over recent years. The production of such components is extremely sensitive to a number of variables that may potentially lead to significant changes in the surface geometry, often regarded as a crucial determinant of the product¿s functionality and quality. So far, traditional large-scale quality assessment techniques have been used in micromoulding. However, these techniques are not entirely suitable for small scales . Techniques such as Atomic Force Mi- croscopy (AFM) or White Light Interferometry (WLI) have been used for obtaining full three-dimensional profiles of micromoulded components, pro- ducing large data sets that are very difficult to manage. This work presents a method of characterizing surface features of micro and nano scale based on the use of the Biharmonic equation as means of describing surface profiles whilst guaranteeing tangential (C1) continuity. Thus, the problem of rep- resenting surface features of micromoulded components from massive point clouds is transformed into a boundary-value problem, reducing the amount of data required to describe any given surface feature.The boundary condi- tions needed for finding a particular solution to the Biharmonic equation are extracted from the data set and the coefficients associated with a suitable analytic solution are used to describe key design parameters or geometric properties of a surface feature. Moreover, the expressions found for describ- ing key design parameters in terms of the analytic solution to the Biharmonic equation may lead to a more suitable quality assessment technique for micromoulding than the criteria currently used. In summary this technique provides a means for compressing point clouds representing surface features whilst providing an analytic description of such features. The work is applicable to many other instances where surface topography is in need of efficient representation. / EPSRC

The computation of curvature quantities over discrete geometry is often required when processing geometry composed of meshes. Curvature information is often important for the purpose of shape analysis, feature recognition and geometry segmentation. In this paper we present a method for accurate estimation of curvature on discrete geometry especially those composed of meshes. We utilise a method based on fitting a continuous surface arising from the solution of the Biharmonic equation subject to suitable boundary conditions over a 1-ring neighbourhood of the mesh geometry model. This enables us to accurately determine the curvature distribution of the local area. We show how the curvature can be computed efficiently by means of utilising an analytic solution representation of the chosen Biharmonic equation. In order to demonstrate the method we present a series of examples whereby we show how the curvature can be efficiently computed over complex geometry which are represented discretely by means of mesh models.

Nesse trabalho estudamos questões de existência, multiplicidade e concentração de soluções de uma classe de problemas elípticos biharmônicos. Nos três primeiros capítulos são utilizados métodos variacionais para estudar a existência, multiplicidade e comportamento assintótico das soluções fracas não-triviais de equações de Schrödinger estacionárias biharmônicas com diferentes hipóteses sobre o potencial e sobre a não-linearidade. No último capítulo, o método de decomposição em cones duais é empregado para obter a existência de três soluções (positiva, negativa e nodal) para uma equação biharmônica / In this work we study some problems on existence, multiplicity and concentration of solutions of biharmonic elliptic equtions. In the first three chapters, variational methods are used to study the existence, multiplicity and the asymptotic behavior of weak nontrivial solutions of stationary Schrödinger biharmonic equations under certain assumptions on the potential function and the nonlinearity. In the last chapter we use variational methods again and also the dual decomposition method to get existence of positive, negative and sign-changing solutions for a biharmonic equation

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