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Unisolvent point set

In approximation theory, a finite collection of points is often called unisolvent for a space if any element is uniquely determined by its values on . is unisolvent for if there exists a unique polynomial in of lowest possible degree which interpolates the data .

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In approximation theory, a finite collection of points X R n {\displaystyle X\subset \mathbb {R} ^{n}} is often called unisolvent for a space W {\displaystyle W} if any element w W {\displaystyle w\in W} is uniquely determined by its values on X {\displaystyle X} .
X {\displaystyle X} is unisolvent for Π n m {\displaystyle \Pi _{n}^{m}} (polynomials in n variables of degree at most m) if there exists a unique polynomial in Π n m {\displaystyle \Pi _{n}^{m}} of lowest possible degree which interpolates the data X {\displaystyle X} .

Simple examples in R {\displaystyle \mathbb {R} } would be the fact that two distinct points determine a line, three points determine a parabola, etc. It is clear that over R {\displaystyle \mathbb {R} } , any collection of k + 1 distinct points will uniquely determine a polynomial of lowest possible degree in Π k {\displaystyle \Pi ^{k}} .

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