{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,12]],"date-time":"2025-10-12T03:40:03Z","timestamp":1760240403375,"version":"build-2065373602"},"reference-count":21,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"11","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2019,6,3]],"date-time":"2019-06-03T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1559520000000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/100008354","name":"Callaghan Innovation","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["TNNX1601"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["TNNX1601"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/100008354","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"name":"Trimble Navigation New Zealand","award":["TNNX1601"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["TNNX1601"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Remote Sensing"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Point normal calculation and cloud registration are two of the most common operations in point cloud processing. However, both are vulnerable to issues of numerical precision and loss of significance. This paper documents how loss of significance in the open-source Point Cloud Library can create erroneous point normals and cause cloud registration to fail. Several test clouds are used to demonstrate how the loss of significance is caused by tight point spacing and clouds being shifted far from the origin of their coordinate system. The results show that extreme loss of significance can cause point normals to be calculated with a random orientation, and cause meters of error during cloud registration. Depending on the structure of the point cloud, loss of significance can occur when the cloud is at hundreds or even tens of meters from the origin of its coordinate system. Shifting to larger data types (e.g., from 32-bit \u201cfloats\u201d to 64-bit \u201cdoubles\u201d) can alleviate the problem but will not solve it completely. Several \u201cbest practice\u201d recommendations for avoiding this issue are proposed. But the only solution guaranteed to eliminate loss of significance is de-meaning the entire cloud, or clusters of points before processing.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/rs11111329","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2019,6,3]],"date-time":"2019-06-03T11:31:01Z","timestamp":1559561461000},"page":"1329","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":4,"title":["Loss of Significance and Its Effect on Point Normal Orientation and Cloud Registration"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"11","author":[{"given":"Matthew","family":"Young","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Canterbury, Christchurch 8041, New Zealand"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Chris","family":"Pretty","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Canterbury, Christchurch 8041, New Zealand"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-7008-1756","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"S\u00e9rgio","family":"Agostinho","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute for Systems and Robotics (ISR\/IST), Instituto Superior T\u00e9cnico, Universidade de Lisboa, 1049-001 Lisboa, Portugal"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Richard","family":"Green","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Computer Science and Software Engineering Department, University of Canterbury, Christchurch 8041, New Zealand"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-3227-4607","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Xiaoqi","family":"Chen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Canterbury, Christchurch 8041, New Zealand"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,6,3]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Rusu, R.B., and Cousins, S. 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