The Level Set Method: What's in it for you?

Stanley Osher
Mathematics
UCLA

The level set method for capturing moving fronts was introduced 
in 1987 by Osher and Sethian. It has proven to be phenomenally 
successful as a numerical device. For example, typing in "Level 
Set Methods" on Google's search engine gives roughly 4000 
responses. Applications range from capturing multiphase fluid 
dynamical flows, to special effects in Hollywood to visualization,
image processing, control, epitaxial growth, computer vision and 
many more. In this talk we shall give a quick overview of the 
numerical technology, where it fits in the general field of PDE 
based imaging science and some applications, including visibility 
(joint work with Tsai, Cheng, Burchard and Sapiro) and image 
decomposition joint  work with Vese ans Sole).