Spherical interpolation of scattered data using least squares thin-plate spline and inverse multiquadric functions

Abstract

We construct some smooth functions defined over a sphere that interpolate large sets of scattered data, using some modified Shepard methods, the least squares thin-plate spline and the inverse multiquadric functions. We illustrate the benefits of our methods in numerical examples for some test functions and some real data applications.

Authors

Teodora Cătinaş
Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Andra Malina
Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania
Tiberiu Popoviciu Institute of Numerical Analysis, Romanian Academy, Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Keywords

Interpolation of scattered data; Sphere; Shepard operator; Least squares approximation; Thin plate spline; Inverse multiquadric; Spiral points; Error estimations

Paper coordinates

T. Catinas, A. Malina,  Spherical interpolation of scattered data using least squares thin-plate spline and inverse multiquadratic functions, Numerical Algorithms, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11075-024-01755-6

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Numerical Algorithms

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Spherical interpolation of scattered data using least squares thin-plate spline and inverse multiquadric functions

Spherical interpolation of scattered data using
least squares thin-plate spline and
inverse multiquadric functions

Teodora Cătinaş1 and Andra Malina1,2
Abstract.

We construct some smooth functions defined over a sphere that interpolate large sets of scattered data, using some modified Shepard methods, the least squares thin-plate spline and the inverse multiquadric functions. We illustrate the benefits of our methods in numerical examples for some test functions and some real data applications.

Keywords: Interpolation of scattered data, sphere, Shepard operator, least squares approximation, thin plate spline, inverse multiquadric, spiral points, error estimations.

MSC 2020 Subject Classification: 41A05, 41A25, 41A80, 65D05, 65D15, 65D12, 33C55.

1Babeş-Bolyai University, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Str. M. Kogălniceanu Nr. 1, RO-400084 Cluj-Napoca, Romania, e-mails: teodora.catinas@ubbcluj.ro (corresponding author), andra.malina@ubbcluj.ro.
2Tiberiu Popoviciu Institute of Numerical Analysis, Romanian Academy, Cluj-Napoca, Romania.

1. Preliminaries

We consider here the problem of interpolating large scattered data sets lying on a sphere by using a Shepard type method and some radial basis functions. This interpolation problem is important as it appears in solving some problems related to some physical phenomenons, such as temperature, rainfall, pressure, ozone or gravitational forces, measured at various points on the surface of the Earth; they could also be applied in modelling closed surfaces in CAGD, see, e.g., [7]. As it is mentioned in [9] and [25], these type of data fitting problems, where the underlying domain is the sphere, arises in many areas, including, e.g., geophysics and meteorology, as, in general, the sphere is taken as a model of the Earth. Many authors have investigated the approximation of functions on the sphere by means of polynomials or radial basis functions (see, e.g, [1], [2], [7]-[12], [17], [19], [25]), the main motivation being the need to approximate geophysical quantities.

The Shepard method, introduced in [24], is one of the best suited methods for approximating large sets of data. It has the advantages of a small storage requirement and an easy generalization to additional independent variables, but it suffers from no good reproduction quality, low accuracy and a high computational cost relative to some alternative methods [22], these being the reasons for finding new methods that improve it (see, e.g., [3]-[6], [13], [20], [27]). The radial basis functions are suitable tools for scattered data, and for data that varies rapidly over short distances.

Our purpose in this paper is to introduce some combined Shepard methods using the least squares thin-plate spline and the inverse multiquadric functions, so our method involves also least squares approximation method, not just radial basis functions as, for example, in [9], [12] and [25].

Combined polynomial and radial basis function approximations have often been studied in the context of radial basis functions constructed from conditionally positive definite kernels, in which case a polynomial part is needed to make the theory work. Here, we restrict our attention to the case of (conditionally) strictly positive definite kernels, including a polynomial component, motivated by the fact that approximations of this kind offer real advantages.

The numerical tests on different types of data prove the efficiency of the method. Moreover, a physical phenomenon is investigated, namely temperature prediction on the Earth’s surface, and the results show that this method is a powerful instrument for solving various problems that model real life phenomena.

2. Combined spherical Shepard method

Following the idea and some notations from [7], we introduce several modifications of the spherical Shepard method using spherical radial basis functions.

Let Sbe the unit sphere in 3 centered at the origin. Let us consider the set of distinct nodes 𝐱i=(xi,yi,zi),i=1,,n, lying on S and the corresponding function values fi,i=1,,n, with f:S. For 𝐱=(x,y,z)S the modified spherical Shepard operator is defined as (see, e.g., [7])

(2.1) S(𝐱)=j=1nwj(𝐱)fjk=1nwk(𝐱),

with

(2.2) wj(𝐱)=[(Rjwg(𝐱,𝐱j))+Rjwg(𝐱,𝐱j)]2,

and Rjw is a radius of influence about the node j and the geodesic distance g between 𝐱 and 𝐱j defined as

(2.3) g(𝐱,𝐱j)=arccos(𝐱𝐱j),

where u+=max{0,u} and ′′′′ denotes the Euclidean inner product of the two vectors.

For a set of scattered data X={𝐱1,𝐱2,,𝐱n} the mesh norm hX is defined by hX=supxSg(x,X), where g denotes the geodesic distance.

If we denote by (see, e.g., [7])

w¯j(𝐱)=wj(𝐱)k=1nwk(𝐱),

then we have the following properties of the weights:

  1. 1.

    the cardinality property: w¯j(𝐱i)=δij;

  2. 2.

    the partition of unity property: j=1nw¯j(𝐱)=1.

Definition 2.1.

(see, e.g., [19]) Let ψ:[0,π] be a continuous function. We say that ψ is strictly positive definite on S (ψ SPD) if, for any set of n distinct points 𝐱i,i=1,,n, lying on S, the quadratic form

(2.4) j=1nk=1najakψ(g(𝐱j,𝐱k))

is positive on n{𝟎}.

We recall some notions from [19]. A polynomial p:3 of degree d,d0 is homogeneous of degree d if p(t𝐱)=tdp(𝐱), for any 𝐱3 and t>0. The polynomial p is harmonic if Δp(𝐱)=0, for any 𝐱3, where Δ is the Laplace operator, i.e.,

Δp=2px2+2py2+2pz2.

So, if 𝒫d is the set of polynomials of degree d in 3 that are harmonic and homogeneous of order d, we can define the set

d(S)={p|S:p𝒫d}

of spherical harmonics of exact order d. The dimension of d(S) is

dimd(S)=2d+1.

Denoting the space of spherical harmonics of maximum order d by d(S), we have

d(S)=j=0dj(S).

It follows that the dimension of d(S) is

dimHd(S)=(d+1)2.
Definition 2.2.

(see, e.g., [19]) Let ψ:[0,π] be a continuous function and m a positive integer. We say that ψ is conditionally strictly positive definite on S of order m (ψ CSPD(m)) if, for any set of n distinct points 𝐱i,i=1,,n, lying on S, the quadratic form (2.4) is positive on

Wm1={𝐚n{𝟎}:i=1naiy(𝐱i)=0 for all ym1(S)}.
Definition 2.3.

(see, e.g., [7]) For a set of distinct nodes 𝐱i=(xi,yi,zi),i=1,,n, lying on S and the corresponding function values fi,i=1,,n, with f:S, the zonal basis function interpolant s(1):S is defined as

(2.5) s(1)(𝐱)=j=1najψ(g(𝐱,𝐱j)),

with the coefficients aj,j=1,,n, obtained from the interpolation relations

s(1)(𝐱i)=fi,i=1,,n,

where g(𝐱,𝐱j) is the geodesic distance between 𝐱 and 𝐱j and ψ:[0,π] is a zonal basis function, i.e., the sphere analogue of the Euclidean radial basis function.

Definition 2.4.

(see, e.g., [8]) For a set of distinct nodes 𝐱i=(xi,yi,zi),i=1,,n, lying on S and the corresponding function values fi,i=1,,n, with f:S, the augmented zonal basis function interpolant s(2):S is defined as

(2.6) s(2)(𝐱)=j=1najψ(g(𝐱,𝐱j))+k=1DAkyk(𝐱),

with D=dimd(S), {y1,,yD} is a basis for d(S) and the coefficients aj,j=1,,n, and Ak,k=1,,D, obtained from the interpolation conditions

s(2)(𝐱i)=fi,i=1,,n,

and by the constraints

i=1naiyk(𝐱i)=0,k=1,,D.
Definition 2.5.

(see, e.g., [7]) Considering for each node 𝐱j,j=1,,n, a set Ij that contains the indices of nZ closest neighbours of 𝐱j, we define a local zonal basis function interpolant sj(1):S as

(2.7) sj(1)(𝐱)=iIjaijψ(g(𝐱,𝐱j)),

with the coefficients aij,iIj,j=1,,n, obtained from the interpolation relations

sj(1)(𝐱i)=fi,iIj,j=1,,n.
Definition 2.6.

(see, e.g., [8]) Considering for each node 𝐱j,j=1,,n, a set Ij that contains the indices of nZ closest neighbours of 𝐱j, we introduce here the augmented local zonal basis function interpolant sj(2):S as

(2.8) sj(2)(𝐱)=iIjaijψ(g(𝐱,𝐱j))+k=1DAkjyk(𝐱),

with D=dimd(S),DnZ, {y1,,yD} basis for d(S) and the coefficients aij,iIj,j=1,,n, and Akj,k=1,,D, obtained from the interpolation conditions

sj(2)(𝐱i)=fi,iIj,j=1,,n,

and the constraints

iIjaijyk(𝐱i)=0,j=1,,n,k=1,,D.

Now we introduce the new local Shepard interpolants,

(2.9) S1(𝐱)=j=1nwj(𝐱)Zj(1)(𝐱)k=1nwk(𝐱),

with the local zonal basis function given by

Zj(1)(𝐱)=iIjaijψ1(g(𝐱,𝐱i))

and

(2.10) S2(𝐱)=j=1nwj(𝐱)Zj(2)(𝐱)k=1nwk(𝐱),

with

Zj(2)(𝐱)=iIjaijψ1(g(𝐱,𝐱i))+k=1DAkjyk(𝐱),

considering the thin-plate spline spherical radial basis function (see, e.g., [2])

ψ1(r)=r2logr,r=2sin(t/2),t=g(𝐱,𝐲)=arccos(𝐱𝐲).
Remark 2.7.

[19] Based on Definition 2.2, the thin-plate spline spherical radial basis function ψ1 is conditionally strictly positive definite on S of order 2.

Similarly, we introduce

(2.11) S3(𝐱)=j=1nwj(𝐱)Zj(3)(𝐱)k=1nwk(𝐱),

with the local zonal basis function given by

Zj(3)(𝐱)=iIjaijψ2(g(𝐱,𝐱i))

and

(2.12) S4(𝐱)=j=1nwj(𝐱)Zj(4)(𝐱)k=1nwk(𝐱),

with

(2.13) Zj(4)(𝐱)=iIjaijψ2(g(𝐱,𝐱i))+k=1DAkjyk(𝐱),

considering the inverse multiquadric spherical radial basis function (see, e.g., [2])

ψ2(r)=(r2+c2)12,r=2sin(t/2),t=g(𝐱,𝐲)=arccos(𝐱𝐲).
Remark 2.8.

[19] Based on Definition 2.1, the inverse multiquadric spherical radial basis function ψ2 is strictly positive definite on S.

Using a result from [20], we obtain the following estimations of the errors for the local Shepard operators introduced here.

Theorem 2.9.

Consider a set of distinct nodes 𝐱k,k=1,,n, lying on S and the corresponding function values fk,k=1,,n, with f:S. For each 𝐱S, we have the following approximation of the error of the Shepard operators Si,i=1,,4, given by (2.9), (2.10), (2.11) and (2.12):

Ei(x)=|f(𝐱)Si(𝐱)|j=1nw¯j(𝐱)ej(𝐱),i=1,2,3,4,

with ej(𝐱)=|f(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱)| being the interpolation error of the local basis functions Zj(i),i=1,,4, on the set of nodes 𝐱k,kIj, Ij containing the indices of nZ closest neighbours of 𝐱j, j=1,,n. In addition, we have

Ei(𝐱) maxj=1,,nej(𝐱), for i=1,,4, and 𝐱S.
Proof.
Ei(𝐱) =|f(𝐱)Si(𝐱)|=|f(𝐱)1j=1nw¯j(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱)|
=|f(𝐱)j=1nw¯j(𝐱)j=1nw¯j(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱)|=|j=1nw¯j(𝐱)[f(x)Zj(i)(𝐱)]|
j=1n|w¯j(𝐱)[f(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱)]|=j=1nw¯j(𝐱)|f(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱)|
=j=1nw¯j(𝐱)ej(𝐱), for each i=1,,4, and each 𝐱S.

Since,

Ei(𝐱)=|f(𝐱)Si(𝐱)| j=1nw¯j(𝐱)|f(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱)|=j=1nw¯j(𝐱)ej(𝐱),

we get

Ei(𝐱) maxj=1,,nej(𝐱)j=1nw¯j(𝐱)=maxj=1,,nej(𝐱), for i=1,,4, and 𝐱S.

Theorem 2.10.

Consider a set of distinct nodes 𝐱i,i=1,,n, lying on S and the corresponding function values fi,i=1,,n, with f:S. For the Shepard operators S1,S3 given in (2.9) and (2.11), respectively, we have Si(𝐱)C1(S), i=1,3.

Proof.

The proof follows directly from Theorem 1 of [7], considering p=2. ∎

Theorem 2.11.

For fC(S), the following estimation holds:

|Si(𝐱)f(𝐱)|j=1nw¯j(𝐱)|Zj(i)(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱j)|+ω(f,hX),fori=1,,4,

where ω(f,hX)=supd(𝐱,𝐲)hX|f(𝐱)f(𝐲)| is the modulus of continuity of f.

Proof.
|Si(𝐱)f(𝐱)| =|j=1nw¯j(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱)f(𝐱)j=1nw¯j(𝐱)|=|j=1nw¯j(𝐱)[Zj(i)(𝐱)f(𝐱)]|
=|j=1nw¯j(𝐱)[Zj(i)(𝐱)f(𝐱j)+f(𝐱j)f(𝐱)]|
j=1nw¯j(𝐱)|Zj(i)(𝐱)f(𝐱j)|+j=1nw¯j(𝐱)|f(𝐱j)f(𝐱)|
j=1nw¯j(𝐱)|Zj(i)(𝐱)Zj(i)(𝐱j)|+ω(f,hX),i=1,,4.

3. Test results

  • Numerical results on test functions

We use the following test functions (see, e.g., [15], [16], [21], [22]) to illustrate the theoretical results:

f1(x,y,z)=34exp[(9x2)2+(9y2)2+(9z2)24]+34exp[(9x+1)2499y+1109z+110]++12exp[(9x7)2+(9y3)2+(9z5)24]15exp[(9x4)2(9y7)2(9z5)2],f2(x,y,z)=[1.25+cos(5.4y)]cos(6z)6+6(3x1)2,f3(x,y,z)=exp[8116((x0.5)2+(y0.5)2+(z0.5)2)]/3,f4(x,y,z)=exp[814((x0.5)2+(y0.5)2+(z0.5)2)]/3.

We consider two cases for the choice of nodes and points on which the operators are constructed.

For the first case, we evaluate the operators on 1000 random points on the unit sphere S, using sets of 500, 1000 and 2000 spiral nodes, respectively. These nodes are constructed based on a method proposed in [23]. To describe them, we use their spherical coordinates

𝐱j=(cosθjsinφj,sinθjsinφj,cosφj), 1jn,

with

θ1=θn=0,θj=θj1+3.6[n(1hj2)]1/2, 2jn1,φj=arccoshj,hj=1+2(j1)/(n1), 1jn.

In Tables 1 and 2 we list the maximum absolute errors (MAEs) and the root mean square errors (RMSEs) for the thin-plate spline case, given in (2.9) and for the inverse multiquadric case, given in (2.11).

The shape parameter c in the inverse multiquadric case, we have computed as 1/(0.815d), where d=1ni=1ndi, with di being the distance from the node i to its closest neighbour, following the idea proposed by Hardy in [18]. We also used the method proposed in [14, Program 2], but the results are comparable.

We consider also the case of zonal basis functions combined with spherical harmonics. For S2 and for S4, given in (2.10) and (2.12), we take the particular cases

Zj(2k)(𝐱)=iIjaijψk(g(𝐱,𝐱i))+Ajx+Bjy+Cjz,k=1,2.

Tables 3 and 4 contain the approximation errors for S2 and S4.

Numerical experiments have shown that in our cases, a good value for the number of closest neighbours of a node is nZ=17, but its choice is not an easy task, since there are many factors that could influence the numerical results, as it is also emphasized in [10].

We also show the computational times (CPU) of the methods considered above. Comparing the approximation results, one can see that in most of the cases, the thin-plate spline function is slightly more accurate, although good results were obtained in the case of inverse multiquadric function as well. For both zonal basis functions, the addition of a spherical harmonic produces an improved accuracy in the majority of cases, the computational times being quite equivalent.

Nr. nodes MAE RMSE CPU (s)
500 3.2578e02 2.2321e05 117.85
f1 1000 2.2958e02 9.9540e06 314.53
2000 1.1860e02 4.6365e06 692.82
500 3.1537e02 2.7775e05 109.41
f2 1000 2.6771e02 2.7090e05 314.45
2000 2.2190e02 1.7779e05 688.81
500 7.3569e03 2.8918e06 115.79
f3 1000 6.0472e03 1.5925e06 315.37
2000 2.8635e03 6.5172e07 690.19
500 1.7325e03 1.6889e07 111.82
f4 1000 1.8758e03 1.9919e07 320.68
2000 6.5981e04 2.5141e08 697.34
Table 1. MAEs and RMSEs for S1,

1000 random points, spiral nodes.

Nr. nodes c MAE RMSE CPU (s)
500 7.79 1.8202e02 2.1817e05 116.06
f1 1000 10.99 6.6561e02 2.5327e04 310.39
2000 15.53 7.2750e03 2.5776e06 749.19
500 7.79 2.4314e01 1.0818e03 119.24
f2 1000 10.99 1.1027e01 2.9840e04 304.50
2000 15.53 1.5101e01 2.2838e04 772.28
500 7.79 1.5149e02 7.5269e06 120.12
f3 1000 10.99 4.2372e02 2.4161e05 304.88
2000 15.53 4.6122e03 2.6350e07 717.83
500 7.79 2.9829e03 2.6177e07 118.44
f4 1000 10.99 8.8486e03 6.4296e06 306.77
2000 15.53 2.4603e03 1.8618e07 719.70
Table 2. MAEs and RMSEs for S3,

1000 random points, spiral nodes.

Nr. nodes MAE RMSE CPU (s)
500 1.9314e02 5.5752e06 122.05
f1 1000 1.0302e02 4.7440e06 325.28
2000 7.3163e03 1.4137e06 732.32
500 3.0368e02 3.0068e05 124.85
f2 1000 2.4868e02 1.9924e05 313.66
2000 2.3958e02 1.9921e05 726.74
500 2.8178e03 6.1637e07 133.43
f3 1000 4.1202e03 8.0461e07 322.11
2000 2.0158e03 1.6570e07 748.56
500 6.5754e04 2.8497e08 126.62
f4 1000 2.7432e03 2.2982e07 317.47
2000 4.4006e04 4.3163e09 740.68
Table 3. MAEs and RMSEs for S2,

1000 random points, spiral nodes.

Nr. nodes c MAE RMSE CPU (s)
500 7.79 1.9915e02 2.0435e05 123.83
f1 1000 10.99 4.0497e02 1.3859e05 316.01
2000 15.53 1.4464e02 4.0249e06 755.33
500 7.79 1.4447e01 5.4102e04 122.07
f2 1000 10.99 1.0639e01 2.7742e04 318.14
2000 15.53 4.4779e01 1.3011e03 753.00
500 7.79 1.4584e02 6.0139e06 123.95
f3 1000 10.99 7.8427e03 2.9137e06 333.27
2000 15.53 2.3339e03 3.2443e07 864.04
500 7.79 2.5051e03 1.8973e07 122.34
f4 1000 10.99 9.7760e03 4.8077e06 326.46
2000 15.53 4.9442e03 7.1491e07 794.43
Table 4. MAEs and RMSEs for S4,

1000 random points, spiral nodes.

In the second case, for a fair distribution of points on the sphere, as proposed in [7], we evaluate the operator on a set of 600 spiral points, using sets of 1000, 2000, 5000 Halton nodes, respectively. The Halton nodes are constructed following the method proposed in [26]. The approximation errors for the operators S1, S3 are displayed in Tables 5 and 6 and the results for the particular case of operators combined with a spherical harmonic S2 and S4 are given in Tables 7 and 8. The same advantages as in the first case can be observed.

Nr. nodes MAE RMSE
1000 7.4316e02 1.7509e05
f1 2000 8.4188e02 1.4907e05
5000 6.3510e02 1.8522e05
1000 5.6039e02 3.7727e05
f2 2000 5.0967e02 3.9249e05
5000 4.3811e02 3.6163e05
1000 3.5525e02 9.1690e06
f3 2000 3.5480e02 5.7143e06
5000 2.7195e02 1.5453e05
1000 3.7610e02 2.5880e06
f4 2000 4.6500e02 3.5632e06
5000 2.4349e02 2.9733e06
Table 5. MAEs and RMSEs for S1,

600 spiral points, Halton nodes.

Nr. nodes c MAE RMSE
1000 16.86 1.9497e01 1.1405e04
f1 2000 23.18 2.2827e01 9.9974e05
5000 37.97 5.2255e02 2.9773e05
1000 16.86 1.5185e01 4.1688e04
f2 2000 23.18 7.1859e02 2.1580e04
5000 37.97 8.5831e01 2.0718e02
1000 16.86 5.9248e02 2.1246e05
f3 2000 23.18 3.4550e02 8.5223e06
5000 37.97 3.3702e02 3.7609e05
1000 16.86 1.2690e01 4.1630e05
f4 2000 23.18 4.0462e02 5.1387e06
5000 37.97 1.8915e02 2.7590e06
Table 6. MAEs and RMSEs for S3,

600 spiral points, Halton nodes.

Nr. nodes MAE RMSE
1000 7.0038e02 1.1291e05
f1 2000 7.5987e02 1.0503e05
5000 5.9442e02 8.0161e06
1000 4.4536e02 2.5508e05
f2 2000 4.1134e02 2.0341e05
5000 2.9308e02 1.5827e05
1000 1.9029e02 1.8374e06
f3 2000 2.0527e02 1.6900e06
5000 1.2587e02 1.0525e06
1000 3.4529e02 2.1881e06
f4 2000 4.0937e02 2.6213e06
5000 2.2381e02 1.1738e06
Table 7. MAEs and RMSEs for S2,

600 spiral points, Halton nodes.

Nr. nodes c MAE RMSE
1000 16.86 3.2990e01 2.7518e04
f1 2000 23.18 2.5271e01 1.1180e04
5000 37.97 9.2228e02 3.7367e05
1000 16.86 1.0212e01 1.6366e04
f2 2000 23.18 3.8079e01 1.9570e04
5000 37.97 1.9549e01 1.4872e03
1000 16.86 3.3626e01 1.0873e04
f3 2000 23.18 2.1943e02 2.8096e06
5000 37.97 1.8473e02 7.6410e06
1000 16.86 2.7218e01 1.3480e04
f4 2000 23.18 4.0405e02 6.2197e06
5000 37.97 1.4059e02 1.9787e06
Table 8. MAEs and RMSEs for S4,

600 spiral points, Halton nodes.

To obtain a real visualisation effect of the numerical results, in Figures 1, 2 we plot the functions values fi, i=1,2, and the values of the corresponding Shepard interpolants S1fi and S3fi, i=1,2, considering 1000 Halton nodes and 20000 spiral points on the unit sphere. In Table 9 we list the MAEs and the RMSEs in this case, for all the functions fi,i=1,,4.

Refer to caption
(a) f1.
Refer to caption
(b) S1f1.
Refer to caption
(c) S3f1.
Figure 1. Graphs for f1, 1000 Halton nodes and 20000 spiral points.
Refer to caption
(a) f2.
Refer to caption
(b) S1f2.
Refer to caption
(c) S3f2.
Figure 2. Graphs for f2, 1000 Halton nodes and 20000 spiral points.
MAE RMSE
S1f1 1.2166e01 2.5642e05
S3f1 2.2525e01 6.4609e05
S1f2 5.8937e02 3.8955e05
S3f2 2.0732e01 2.1672e04
S1f3 4.3426e02 1.0547e05
S3f3 1.1625e01 2.2429e05
S1f4 3.7645e02 2.0534e06
S3f4 2.9282e01 4.1192e05
Table 9. MAEs and RMSEs for the graphical representations,

20.000 spiral points, 1000 Halton nodes.

Finally, we compared our results with the ones obtained in the case of the modified spherical Shepard operator S, defined in (2.1). In Table 10 we have the MAEs and RMSEs for the case of spiral nodes and 1000 random points and in Table 11 we have the errors for the case of Halton nodes and 600 spiral points. Comparing the results, one can observe the benefits of choosing the combined operators with the zonal basis functions, since in the majority of cases, the interpolation results are more accurate.

Nr. nodes MAE RMSE
500 4.9021e02 4.8743e05
f1 1000 6.0353e02 5.5633e05
2000 3.4329e02 1.7559e05
500 8.7878e02 2.7945e04
f2 1000 7.2557e02 1.5679e04
2000 6.4732e02 1.1091e04
500 3.1649e03 5.7100e07
f3 1000 4.2330e03 1.0176e06
2000 3.2662e03 3.5713e07
500 2.0344e04 1.1985e09
f4 1000 9.3249e04 3.5749e08
2000 3.5708e04 3.0553e09
Table 10. MAEs and RMSEs for the spherical Shepard op. S,

1000 random points, spiral nodes.

Nr. nodes MAE RMSE
1000 1.4804e01 7.0893e05
f1 2000 1.5724e01 5.6844e05
5000 1.4251e01 3.9716e05
1000 1.0668e01 1.7301e04
f2 2000 1.0233e01 1.4494e04
5000 7.0956e02 1.1105e04
1000 5.8005e02 1.9582e05
f3 2000 6.9905e02 2.0165e05
5000 5.0078e02 1.3893e05
1000 7.6027e02 1.0435e05
f4 2000 8.6042e02 1.1769e05
5000 5.3431e02 6.2977e06
Table 11. MAEs and RMSEs for the spherical Shepard op. S,

600 spiral points, Halton nodes.

The experiments were performed in Matlab.

  • Numerical results in a real data application

We consider an example of approximation for some real data, namely the monthly-mean temperatures on the Globe in January 2010 and June 2010. The set of data was selected from [28]. For our numerical tests we considered 1073 nodes and we reconstructed the temperature values for 21449 points on the Globe, after we projected the latitude and longitude of each point onto the unit sphere S. A representation for the sets of nodes and points is given in Figure 3.

Refer to caption
(a) Interpolation nodes.
Refer to caption
(b) The set of points.
Figure 3. Representation of the data set.

To handle the global part, we considered the case of zonal basis functions combined with a spherical harmonic, S2 and S4. For the inverse multiquadric case, we computed the parameter c as in the previous numerical tests (see, e.g., [18]). The value obtained was c=35.26. In Table 12 there are given the mean absolute errors (MAEs) and the root mean square errors (RMSEs). Figures 4, 5 present the graphical results for the temperatures in January 2010 and June 2010, respectively. Studying the results obtained for this example, there are observed and confirmed the advantages of using the previously introduced combined Shepard operators to real data applications.

January June
S2 S4 S2 S4
MAE 2.08C 2.63C 2.11C 2.75C
RMSE 5.31C 7.61C 5.09C 7.81C
Table 12. Errors for mean global temperatures in

January 2010 and June 2010.

Refer to caption
(a) Real temperatures.
Refer to caption
(b) Approx. temperatures with S2.
Refer to caption
(c) Approx. temperatures with S4.
Figure 4. Mean global temperatures in January 2010.
Refer to caption
(a) Real temperatures.
Refer to caption
(b) Approx. temperatures with S2.
Refer to caption
(c) Approx. temperatures with S4.
Figure 5. Mean global temperatures in June 2010.

Data availability. All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article.

Conflict of interest. The authors have no conflict of interests to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.

Ethical Approval. Not applicable.

Availability of supporting data. Not applicable.

Competing interests. Not applicable.

Funding. Not applicable.

Authors’ contributions. Equal contributions.

Acknowledgments. We are grateful to the referees for the careful reading and for their valuable suggestions that improved the manuscript.

References

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  • [28] https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/shishu1421/global-temperature?select=air_temp.2010

[1] Allasia, G., Cavoretto, R., De Rossi, A., Hermite-Birkhoff interpolation on scattered data on the sphere and other manifolds. Appl. Math. Comput. 318, 35–50 (2018), MathSciNet Google Scholar

[2] Baxter, B.J.C., Hubbert, S., Radial basis functions for the sphere. In: Recent Progress in Multivariate Approximation, Witten-Bommerholz, 2000. Internat. Ser. Numer. Math., vol. 137, pp. 33-47. Birkhäuser, Basel (2001)

[3] Cătinaş, T., The combined Shepard-Abel-Goncharov univariate operator. Rev. Anal. Numér. Théor. Approx. 32, 11–20 (2003), Article Google Scholar

[4] Cătinaş, T., The combined Shepard-Lidstone bivariate operator. In: Trends and Applications in Constructive Approximation. International Series of Numerical Mathematics (de Bruin, M.G. et al. (eds.)), 151, pp. 77–89, Springer Group-Birkhäuser Verlag (2005)

[5] Cătinaş, T., Bivariate interpolation by combined Shepard operators. In: Proceedings of  17^{th} IMACS World Congress, Scientific Computation, Applied Mathematics and Simulation (Borne, P., Benrejeb, M., Dangoumau, N., Lorimier, L. (eds.)), 7 pp., Paris, July 11–15 (2005)

[6] Cătinaş, T., The bivariate Shepard operator of Bernoulli type. Calcolo 44(4), 189–202 (2007), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[7] De Rossi, A., Spherical interpolation of large scattered data sets using zonal basis functions. In: Mathematical Methods for Curves and Surfaces (Daehlen, M., Morken, K., Schumaker, L. (eds.)), pp. 125–134, TrØmso 2004. Nashboro Press (2005)

[8] De Rossi, A., Hybrid spherical approximation. arXiv:1404.1475 (2014)

[9] Cavoretto, R., De Rossi, A., Fast and accurate interpolation of large scattered data sets on the sphere. J. Comput. Appl. Math. 234, 1505–1521 (2010), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[10] Cavoretto, R., De Rossi, A., Numerical comparison of different weights in Shepard’s interpolants on the sphere. Appl. Math. Sci. 4, 3425–3435 (2010), MathSciNet Google Scholar

[11] Cavoretto, R., De Rossi, A., Spherical interpolation using the partition of unity method: an efficient and flexible algorithm. Appl. Math. Lett. 25, 1251–1256 (2012), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[12] Cavoretto, R., De Rossi, A., Achieving accuracy and efficiency in spherical modelling of real data. Math. Methods Appl. Sci. 37, 1449–1459 (2014), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[13] Farwig, R., Rate of convergence of Shepard’s global interpolation formula. Math. Comp. 46, 577–590 (1986), MathSciNet Google Scholar

[14] Fasshauer, G.E., Zhang, J.G., On choosing “optimal’’ shape parameters for RBF approximation. Numer. Algor. 45, 345–368 (2007), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[15] Franke, R., Scattered data interpolation: tests of some methods. Math. Comp. 38, 181–200 (1982), MathSciNet Google Scholar

[16] Franke, R., Nielson, G., Smooth interpolation of large sets of scattered data. Int. J. Numer. Meths. Engrg. 15, 1691–1704 (1980), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[17] Le Gia, Q.T., Sloan, I.H., Wendland, H., Multiscale analysis in Sobolev spaces on the sphere. SIAM J. Numer. Anal. 48(6), 2065–2090 (2010), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[18] Hardy, R.L., Multiquadric equations of topography and other irregular surfaces. J. Geophys. Res. 76, 1905–1915 (1971), Article Google Scholar

[19] Hubbert, S., Le Gia, Q.T., Morton, T., Spherical radial basis functions. Springer, Theory and Applications (2015), Book Google Scholar

[20] Lazzaro, D., Montefusco, L.B., Radial basis functions for multivariate interpolation of large scattered data sets. J. Comput. Appl. Math. 140, 521–536 (2002), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[21] Renka, R.J., Cline, A.K., A triangle-based C¹ interpolation method. Rocky Mountain J. Math. 14, 223–237 (1984), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[22] Renka, R.J., Multivariate interpolation of large sets of scattered data. ACM Trans. Math. Software 14, 139–148 (1988), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[23] Saff, E.B., Kuijlaars, A.B.J., Distributing many points on a sphere. Math. Intelligencer. 19, 5–11 (1997), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[24] Shepard, D., A two dimensional interpolation function for irregularly spaced data. In: Proceedings of the 1968 23rd ACM National Conference, pp. 517–523. ACM (1968)

[25] Sloan, I.H., Sommariva, A., Approximation on the sphere using radial basis functions plus polynomials. Adv. Comput. Math. 29, 147–177 (2008), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

[26] Wong, T.T., Luk, W.S., Heng, P.A., Sampling with Hammersley and Halton Points. J. Graph. Tools 2(2), 9–24 (1997), Article Google Scholar

[27] Zuppa, C.: Error estimates for moving least square approximations. Bull. Braz. Math. Soc. (N.S) 34(2), 231–249 (2003), Article MathSciNet Google Scholar

2024

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