  Let E be the complete Euclidean graph on a set of points embedded in the
plane. Given a constant t >= 1, a spanning subgraph G of E is said to be a
t-spanner, or simply a spanner, if for any pair of vertices u,v in E the
distance between u and v in G is at most t times their distance in E. A spanner
is plane if its edges do not cross.
  This paper considers the question: "What is the smallest maximum degree that
can always be achieved for a plane spanner of E?" Without the planarity
constraint, it is known that the answer is 3 which is thus the best known lower
bound on the degree of any plane spanner. With the planarity requirement, the
best known upper bound on the maximum degree is 6, the last in a long sequence
of results improving the upper bound. In this paper we show that the complete
Euclidean graph always contains a plane spanner of maximum degree at most 4 and
make a big step toward closing the question. Our construction leads to an
efficient algorithm for obtaining the spanner from Chew's L1-Delaunay
triangulation.
