Efficient domination and polarity

The thesis considers the following graph problems: Efficient (Edge) Domination seeks for an independent vertex (edge) subset D such that all other vertices (edges) have exactly one neighbor in D. Polarity asks for a vertex subset that induces a complete multipartite graph and that contains a vertex of every induced P_3. Monopolarity is the special case of Polarity where the wanted vertex subset has to be independent. These problems are NP-complete in general, but efficiently solvable on various graph classes. The thesis sharpens known NP-completeness results and presents new solvable cases

Local Conflict Coloring

Locally finding a solution to symmetry-breaking tasks such as vertex-coloring, edge-coloring, maximal matching, maximal independent set, etc., is a long-standing challenge in distributed network computing. More recently, it has also become a challenge in the framework of centralized local computation. We introduce conflict coloring as a general symmetry-breaking task that includes all the aforementioned tasks as specific instantiations --- conflict coloring includes all locally checkable labeling tasks from [Naor\&Stockmeyer, STOC 1993]. Conflict coloring is characterized by two parameters $l$ and $d$, where the former measures the amount of freedom given to the nodes for selecting their colors, and the latter measures the number of constraints which colors of adjacent nodes are subject to.We show that, in the standard LOCAL model for distributed network computing, if l/d \textgreater{} \Delta, then conflict coloring can be solved in $\tilde O(\sqrt{\Delta})+\log^*n$ rounds in $n$-node graphs with maximum degree $\Delta$, where $\tilde O$ ignores the polylog factors in $\Delta$. The dependency in~$n$ is optimal, as a consequence of the $\Omega(\log^*n)$ lower bound by [Linial, SIAM J. Comp. 1992] for $(\Delta+1)$-coloring. An important special case of our result is a significant improvement over the best known algorithm for distributed $(\Delta+1)$-coloring due to [Barenboim, PODC 2015], which required $\tilde O(\Delta^{3/4})+\log^*n$ rounds. Improvements for other variants of coloring, including $(\Delta+1)$-list-coloring, $(2\Delta-1)$-edge-coloring, $T$-coloring, etc., also follow from our general result on conflict coloring. Likewise, in the framework of centralized local computation algorithms (LCAs), our general result yields an LCA which requires a smaller number of probes than the previously best known algorithm for vertex-coloring, and works for a wide range of coloring problems

Algorithmic Graph Theory

The main focus of this workshop was on mathematical techniques needed for the development of efficient solutions and algorithms for computationally difficult graph problems. The techniques studied at the workshhop included: the probabilistic method and randomized algorithms, approximation and optimization, structured families of graphs and approximation algorithms for large problems. The workshop Algorithmic Graph Theory was attended by 46 participants, many of them being young researchers. In 15 survey talks an overview of recent developments in Algorithmic Graph Theory was given. These talks were supplemented by 10 shorter talks and by two special sessions

Data Reduction for Graph Coloring Problems

This paper studies the kernelization complexity of graph coloring problems with respect to certain structural parameterizations of the input instances. We are interested in how well polynomial-time data reduction can provably shrink instances of coloring problems, in terms of the chosen parameter. It is well known that deciding 3-colorability is already NP-complete, hence parameterizing by the requested number of colors is not fruitful. Instead, we pick up on a research thread initiated by Cai (DAM, 2003) who studied coloring problems parameterized by the modification distance of the input graph to a graph class on which coloring is polynomial-time solvable; for example parameterizing by the number k of vertex-deletions needed to make the graph chordal. We obtain various upper and lower bounds for kernels of such parameterizations of q-Coloring, complementing Cai's study of the time complexity with respect to these parameters. Our results show that the existence of polynomial kernels for q-Coloring parameterized by the vertex-deletion distance to a graph class F is strongly related to the existence of a function f(q) which bounds the number of vertices which are needed to preserve the NO-answer to an instance of q-List-Coloring on F.Comment: Author-accepted manuscript of the article that will appear in the FCT 2011 special issue of Information & Computatio

Dominator Coloring and CD Coloring in Almost Cluster Graphs

In this paper, we study two popular variants of Graph Coloring -- Dominator Coloring and CD Coloring. In both problems, we are given a graph $G$ and a natural number $\ell$ as input and the goal is to properly color the vertices with at most $\ell$ colors with specific constraints. In Dominator Coloring, we require for each $v \in V(G)$, a color $c$ such that $v$ dominates all vertices colored $c$. In CD Coloring, we require for each color $c$, a $v \in V(G)$ which dominates all vertices colored $c$. These problems, defined due to their applications in social and genetic networks, have been studied extensively in the last 15 years. While it is known that both problems are fixed-parameter tractable (FPT) when parameterized by $(t,\ell)$ where $t$ is the treewidth of $G$, we consider strictly structural parameterizations which naturally arise out of the problems' applications. We prove that Dominator Coloring is FPT when parameterized by the size of a graph's cluster vertex deletion (CVD) set and that CD Coloring is FPT parameterized by CVD set size plus the number of remaining cliques. En route, we design a simpler and faster FPT algorithms when the problems are parameterized by the size of a graph's twin cover, a special CVD set. When the parameter is the size of a graph's clique modulator, we design a randomized single-exponential time algorithm for the problems. These algorithms use an inclusion-exclusion based polynomial sieving technique and add to the growing number of applications using this powerful algebraic technique.Comment: 29 pages, 3 figure