# Cover points with minimal number of spheres of fixed radius

I have a set of k n-dimensional points:

P1(x11, x12, ..., x1n), P2(x21, x22, ..., x2n), ..., Pk(xk1, xk2, ..., xkn).

A distance D(Pa, Pb) is defined between any two points, which satisfy usual properties:

1. D(Pa, Pb) >= 0
2. D(Pa, Pb) = 0 <=> Pa = Pb
3. D(Pa, Pb) = D(Pb, Pa)
4. D(Pa, Pc) ≤ D(Pa, Pb) + D(Pb, Pc)

What is the algorithm to find areas in which these points aggregate?
More specifically, given a radius R find the smallest set β of n-dimensional "balls" B(C) such that every point lies inside at least one of the balls:

ⱯPa ƎB(C) ∈ β => D(Pa, C) ≤ R

There is definitely more than one solution (in most cases a ball could be moved a little so that it would still contain the points) and probably there is something else I am missing. But I need an algorithm that would provide at least one solution.

Example:

If
k = 5, n = 2, R = 2, D(Pa, Pb) = euclidean distance on a plane
P1(0,0), P2(1,1), P3(4.5, 4), P4(-4, 1), P5(4,4),

Then
B1(0.5, 0.5) (contains first two points), B2(-4,1) (contains only 4th point), B3(4,4) (contains 3rd and 5th points)

• Yes, I need minimal number of balls. I would want to say that balls should not intersect, but it seems that there would be cases when the problem would be unsolvable. Probably then - minimal number of non-intersecting balls with radius not more than R. Clustering seems to be what I need, thanks!
– xaxa
Oct 15 '15 at 13:56

Construct a graph. Represent every point by a node and connect two nodes with an edge if the distance of the represented points is $\leq R$.