A relation -: algebraic approach to the region connection calculus

We explore the relation - algebraic aspects of the region connection calculus (RCC) of Randell et al., Proceedings of the CADE, vol II, pp. 786-790, Springer, Berlin, 1992a. In particular, we present a refinement of the RCC8 table which shows that the axioms provide for more relations than are listed in the present table. We also show that each RCC model leads to a Boolean algebra. Finally, we prove that a refined version of the RCC5 table has as models all atomless Boolean algebras B with the natural ordering as the "part-of" relation, and that the table is closed under first-order definable relations iff B is homogeneous. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.