spatstat (version 1.56-1)

nndist: Nearest neighbour distances

Description

Computes the distance from each point to its nearest neighbour in a point pattern. Alternatively computes the distance to the second nearest neighbour, or third nearest, etc.

Usage

nndist(X, …)
  # S3 method for ppp
nndist(X, …, k=1, by=NULL, method="C")
  # S3 method for default
nndist(X, Y=NULL, …, k=1, by=NULL, method="C")

Arguments

X,Y

Arguments specifying the locations of a set of points. For nndist.ppp, the argument X should be a point pattern (object of class "ppp"). For nndist.default, typically X and Y would be numeric vectors of equal length. Alternatively Y may be omitted and X may be a list with two components x and y, or a matrix with two columns.

…

Ignored by nndist.ppp and nndist.default.

k

Integer, or integer vector. The algorithm will compute the distance to the kth nearest neighbour.

by

Optional. A factor, which separates X into groups. The algorithm will compute the distance to the nearest point in each group.

method

String specifying which method of calculation to use. Values are "C" and "interpreted".

Value

Numeric vector or matrix containing the nearest neighbour distances for each point.

If k = 1 (the default), the return value is a numeric vector v such that v[i] is the nearest neighbour distance for the ith data point.

If k is a single integer, then the return value is a numeric vector v such that v[i] is the kth nearest neighbour distance for the ith data point.

If k is a vector, then the return value is a matrix m such that m[i,j] is the k[j]th nearest neighbour distance for the ith data point.

If the argument by is given, then the result is a data frame containing the distances described above, from each point of X, to the nearest point in each subset of X defined by the factor by.

Nearest neighbours of each type

If X is a multitype point pattern and by=marks(X), then the algorithm will compute, for each point of X, the distance to the nearest neighbour of each type. See the Examples.

To find the minimum distance from any point of type i to the nearest point of type j, for all combinations of i and j, use the R function aggregate as suggested in the Examples.

Warnings

An infinite or NA value is returned if the distance is not defined (e.g. if there is only one point in the point pattern).

Details

This function computes the Euclidean distance from each point in a point pattern to its nearest neighbour (the nearest other point of the pattern). If k is specified, it computes the distance to the kth nearest neighbour.

The function nndist is generic, with a method for point patterns (objects of class "ppp"), and a default method for coordinate vectors. There is also a method for line segment patterns, nndist.psp.

The method for point patterns expects a single point pattern argument X and returns the vector of its nearest neighbour distances.

The default method expects that X and Y will determine the coordinates of a set of points. Typically X and Y would be numeric vectors of equal length. Alternatively Y may be omitted and X may be a list with two components named x and y, or a matrix or data frame with two columns.

The argument k may be a single integer, or an integer vector. If it is a vector, then the \(k\)th nearest neighbour distances are computed for each value of \(k\) specified in the vector.

If the argument by is given, it should be a factor, of length equal to the number of points in X. This factor effectively partitions X into subsets, each subset associated with one of the levels of X. The algorithm will then compute, for each point of X, the distance to the nearest neighbour in each subset.

The argument method is not normally used. It is retained only for checking the validity of the software. If method = "interpreted" then the distances are computed using interpreted R code only. If method="C" (the default) then C code is used. The C code is faster by two to three orders of magnitude and uses much less memory.

If there is only one point (if x has length 1), then a nearest neighbour distance of Inf is returned. If there are no points (if x has length zero) a numeric vector of length zero is returned.

To identify which point is the nearest neighbour of a given point, use nnwhich.

To use the nearest neighbour distances for statistical inference, it is often advisable to use the edge-corrected empirical distribution, computed by Gest.

To find the nearest neighbour distances from one point pattern to another point pattern, use nncross.

See Also

nndist.psp, pairdist, Gest, nnwhich, nncross.

Examples

# NOT RUN {
   data(cells)
   # nearest neighbours
   d <- nndist(cells)

   # second nearest neighbours
   d2 <- nndist(cells, k=2)

   # first, second and third nearest
   d1to3 <- nndist(cells, k=1:3)

   x <- runif(100)
   y <- runif(100)
   d <- nndist(x, y)

   # Stienen diagram
   plot(cells %mark% (nndist(cells)/2), markscale=1)

   # distance to nearest neighbour of each type
   nnda <- nndist(ants, by=marks(ants)) 
   head(nnda)
   # For nest number 1, the nearest Cataglyphis nest is 87.32125 units away

   # Use of 'aggregate':
   # minimum distance between each pair of types
   aggregate(nnda, by=list(from=marks(ants)), min)
   # Always a symmetric matrix

   # mean nearest neighbour distances
   aggregate(nnda, by=list(from=marks(ants)), mean)
   # The mean distance from a Messor nest to
   # the nearest Cataglyphis nest is 59.02549 units
# }