Shortest Gently Descending Paths.

A path from s to t on a polyhedral terrain is descending if the height of a point p never increases while we move p along the path from s to t. We introduce a generalization of the shortest descending path problem, called the shortest gently descending path (SGDP) problem, where a path descends, but not too steeply. The additional constraint to disallow a very steep descent makes the paths more realistic in practice. We give two approximation algorithms (more precisely, FPTASs) to solve the SGDP problem on general terrains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]