In mathematics, integral geometry is the theory of measures on a geometrical space invariant under the symmetry group of that space. In more recent times, the meaning has been broadened to include a view of invariant (or equivariant) transformations from the space of functions on one geometrical space to the space of functions on another geometrical space. Such transformations often take the form of integral transforms such as the Radon transform and its generalizations.
Integral geometry as such first emerged as an attempt to refine certain statements of geometric probability theory. The early work of Luis Santaló [1] and Wilhelm Blaschke [2] was in this connection. It follows from the classic theorem of Crofton expressing the length of a plane curve as an expectation of the number of intersections with a random line. Here the word 'random' must be interpreted as subject to correct symmetry considerations.
There is a sample space of lines, one on which the affine group of the plane acts. A probability measure is sought on this space, invariant under the symmetry group. If, as in this case, we can find a unique such invariant measure, then that solves the problem of formulating accurately what 'random line' means and expectations become integrals with respect to that measure. (Note for example that the phrase 'random chord of a circle' can be used to construct some paradoxes—for example Bertrand's paradox.)
We can therefore say that integral geometry in this sense is the application of probability theory (as axiomatized by Kolmogorov) in the context of the Erlangen programme of Klein. The content of the theory is effectively that of invariant (smooth) measures on (preferably compact) homogeneous spaces of Lie groups; and the evaluation of integrals of the differential forms. [3]
A very celebrated case is the problem of Buffon's needle: drop a needle on a floor made of planks and calculate the probability the needle lies across a crack. Generalising, this theory is applied to various stochastic processes concerned with geometric and incidence questions. See stochastic geometry.
One of the most interesting theorems in this form of integral geometry is Hadwiger's theorem in the Euclidean setting. Subsequently Hadwiger-type theorems were established in various settings, notably in hermitian geometry, using advanced tools from valuation theory.
The more recent meaning of integral geometry is that of Sigurdur Helgason [4] [5] and Israel Gelfand. [6] It deals more specifically with integral transforms, modeled on the Radon transform. Here the underlying geometrical incidence relation (points lying on lines, in Crofton's case) is seen in a freer light, as the site for an integral transform composed as pullback onto the incidence graph and then push forward.
Probability is a measure of the likeliness that an event will occur. Probability is used to quantify an attitude of mind towards some proposition of whose truth we are not certain. The proposition of interest is usually of the form "A specific event will occur." The attitude of mind is of the form "How certain are we that the event will occur?" The certainty we adopt can be described in terms of a numerical measure and this number, between 0 and 1, we call probability. Probability theory is used extensively in statistics, mathematics, science and philosophy to draw conclusions about the likelihood of potential events and the underlying mechanics of complex systems.
In mathematics, the Radon transform is the integral transform which takes a function f defined on the plane to a function Rf defined on the (two-dimensional) space of lines in the plane, whose value at a particular line is equal to the line integral of the function over that line. The transform was introduced in 1917 by Johann Radon, who also provided a formula for the inverse transform. Radon further included formulas for the transform in three dimensions, in which the integral is taken over planes. It was later generalized to higher-dimensional Euclidean spaces, and more broadly in the context of integral geometry. The complex analogue of the Radon transform is known as the Penrose transform. The Radon transform is widely applicable to tomography, the creation of an image from the projection data associated with cross-sectional scans of an object.
Problems of the following type, and their solution techniques, were first studied in the 18th century, and the general topic became known as geometric probability.
Geometric analysis is a mathematical discipline where tools from differential equations, especially elliptic partial differential equations (PDEs) are used to establish new results in differential geometry and differential topology. The use of linear elliptic PDEs dates at least as far back as Hodge theory. More recently, it refers largely to the use of nonlinear partial differential equations to study geometric and topological properties of spaces, such as submanifolds of Euclidean space, Riemannian manifolds, and symplectic manifolds. This approach dates back to the work by Tibor Radó and Jesse Douglas on minimal surfaces, John Forbes Nash Jr. on isometric embeddings of Riemannian manifolds into Euclidean space, work by Louis Nirenberg on the Minkowski problem and the Weyl problem, and work by Aleksandr Danilovich Aleksandrov and Aleksei Pogorelov on convex hypersurfaces. In the 1980s fundamental contributions by Karen Uhlenbeck, Clifford Taubes, Shing-Tung Yau, Richard Schoen, and Richard Hamilton launched a particularly exciting and productive era of geometric analysis that continues to this day. A celebrated achievement was the solution to the Poincaré conjecture by Grigori Perelman, completing a program initiated and largely carried out by Richard Hamilton.
In mathematics, the Crofton formula, named after Morgan Crofton (1826–1915), is a classic result of integral geometry relating the length of a curve to the expected number of times a "random" line intersects it.
Luís Antoni Santaló Sors was a Spanish mathematician.
In mathematics, the X-ray transform is an integral transform introduced by Fritz John in 1938 that is one of the cornerstones of modern integral geometry. It is very closely related to the Radon transform, and coincides with it in two dimensions. In higher dimensions, the X-ray transform of a function is defined by integrating over lines rather than over hyperplanes as in the Radon transform. The X-ray transform derives its name from X-ray tomography because the X-ray transform of a function ƒ represents the attenuation data of a tomographic scan through an inhomogeneous medium whose density is represented by the function ƒ. Inversion of the X-ray transform is therefore of practical importance because it allows one to reconstruct an unknown density ƒ from its known attenuation data.
This page lists articles related to probability theory. In particular, it lists many articles corresponding to specific probability distributions. Such articles are marked here by a code of the form (X:Y), which refers to number of random variables involved and the type of the distribution. For example (2:DC) indicates a distribution with two random variables, discrete or continuous. Other codes are just abbreviations for topics. The list of codes can be found in the table of contents.
In convex geometry, the Mahler volume of a centrally symmetric convex body is a dimensionless quantity that is associated with the body and is invariant under linear transformations. It is named after German-English mathematician Kurt Mahler. It is known that the shapes with the largest possible Mahler volume are the balls and solid ellipsoids; this is now known as the Blaschke–Santaló inequality. The still-unsolved Mahler conjecture states that the minimum possible Mahler volume is attained by a hypercube.
In mathematics, stochastic geometry is the study of random spatial patterns. At the heart of the subject lies the study of random point patterns. This leads to the theory of spatial point processes, hence notions of Palm conditioning, which extend to the more abstract setting of random measures.
Sigurdur Helgason is an Icelandic mathematician whose research has been devoted to the geometry and analysis on symmetric spaces. In particular he has used new integral geometric methods to establish fundamental existence theorems for differential equations on symmetric spaces as well as some new results on the representations of their isometry groups. He also introduced a Fourier transform on these spaces and proved the principal theorems for this transform, the inversion formula, the Plancherel theorem and the analog of the Paley–Wiener theorem.
In mathematics, an orbital integral is an integral transform that generalizes the spherical mean operator to homogeneous spaces. Instead of integrating over spheres, one integrates over generalized spheres: for a homogeneous space X = G/H, a generalized sphere centered at a point x0 is an orbit of the isotropy group of x0.
This glossary of areas of mathematics is a list of sub-discliplines within pure and applied mathematics. Some entries are broad topics, like algebra, while others are narrower in scope, like convex geometry.
In probability, statistics and related fields, a Poisson point process is a type of random mathematical object that consists of points randomly located on a mathematical space. The Poisson point process is often called simply the Poisson process, but it is also called a Poisson random measure, Poisson random point field or Poisson point field. This point process has convenient mathematical properties, which has led to it being frequently defined in Euclidean space and used as a mathematical model for seemingly random processes in numerous disciplines such as astronomy, biology, ecology, geology, seismology, physics, economics, image processing, and telecommunications.
Rouben V. Ambartzumian is an Armenian mathematician and Academician of National Academy of Sciences of Armenia. He works in Stochastic Geometry and Integral Geometry where he created a new branch, combinatorial integral geometry. The subject of combinatorial integral geometry received support from mathematicians K. Krickeberg and D. G. Kendall at the 1976 Sevan Symposium (Armenia) which was sponsored by Royal Society of London and The London Mathematical Society. In the framework of the later theory he solved a number of classical problems in particular the solution to the Buffon Sylvester problem as well as the Hilbert's fourth problem in 1976. He is a holder of the Rollo Davidson Prize of Cambridge University of 1982. Rouben's interest in Integral Geometry was inherited from his father. Nobel prize winner Allan McLeod Cormack Laureate for Tomography wrote: "Ambartsumian gave the first numerical inversion of the Radon transform and it gives the lie to the often made statement that computed tomography would have been impossible without computers". Victor Hambardzumyan, in his book "A Life in Astrophysics", wrote about the work of Rouben V. Ambartzumian, "More recently, it came to my knowledge that the invariance principle or invariant embedding was applied in a purely mathematical field of integral geometry where it gave birth to a novel, combinatorial branch." See R. V. Ambartzumian, «Combinatorial Integral Geometry», John Wiley, 1982.
