Combinatorial Calabi flows on surfaces

Abstract

For triangulated surfaces, we introduce the combinatorial Calabi flow which is an analogue of smooth Calabi flow. We prove that the solution of combinatorial Calabi flow exists for all time. Moreover, the solution converges if and only if Thurston's circle packing exists. As a consequence, combinatorial Calabi flow provides a new algorithm to find circle packings with prescribed curvatures. The proofs rely on careful analysis of combinatorial Calabi energy, combinatorial Ricci potential and discrete dual-Laplacians.