Analyzing and Visualizing Scalar Fields on Graphs

Yang Zhang, Yusu Wang, Srinivasan Parthasarathy

Abstract: In this article we propose a novel visualization method to explore graphs with numerical attributes associated with nodes - referred to as scalar graphs. The proposed visualization strategy seeks to simultaneously uncover the relationship between attribute values and graph topology, and relies on transforming the network to generate a terrain map. A key objective here is to ensure that the terrain map reveals the overall distribution of components-of-interest (e.g. dense subgraphs, kcores) and the relationships among them while being sensitive to the attribute values over the graph.