State of the Union ( of Geometric Objects ) : A Review ∗

Let C be a set of geometric objects in R. The combinatorial complexity of the union U(C) of C is the total number of faces of all dimensions, of the arrangement of the boundaries of the objects, which lie on its boundary. We survey the known upper bounds on the complexity of the union of n geometric objects satisfying various natural conditions. These problems play a central role in the design and analysis of many geometric algorithms arising in robotics, molecular modeling, solid modeling, and shape matching, and the techniques used for their solutions are interesting in their own right.