17 research outputs found
A Unified View of Graph Regularity via Matrix Decompositions
We prove algorithmic weak and \Szemeredi{} regularity lemmas for several
classes of sparse graphs in the literature, for which only weak regularity
lemmas were previously known. These include core-dense graphs, low threshold
rank graphs, and (a version of) upper regular graphs. More precisely, we
define \emph{cut pseudorandom graphs}, we prove our regularity lemmas for these
graphs, and then we show that cut pseudorandomness captures all of the above
graph classes as special cases.
The core of our approach is an abstracted matrix decomposition, roughly
following Frieze and Kannan [Combinatorica '99] and \Lovasz{} and Szegedy
[Geom.\ Func.\ Anal.\ '07], which can be computed by a simple algorithm by
Charikar [AAC0 '00]. This gives rise to the class of cut pseudorandom graphs,
and using work of Oveis Gharan and Trevisan [TOC '15], it also implies new
PTASes for MAX-CUT, MAX-BISECTION, MIN-BISECTION for a significantly expanded
class of input graphs. (It is NP Hard to get PTASes for these graphs in
general.
An theory of sparse graph convergence I: limits, sparse random graph models, and power law distributions
We introduce and develop a theory of limits for sequences of sparse graphs
based on graphons, which generalizes both the existing theory
of dense graph limits and its extension by Bollob\'as and Riordan to sparse
graphs without dense spots. In doing so, we replace the no dense spots
hypothesis with weaker assumptions, which allow us to analyze graphs with power
law degree distributions. This gives the first broadly applicable limit theory
for sparse graphs with unbounded average degrees. In this paper, we lay the
foundations of the theory of graphons, characterize convergence, and
develop corresponding random graph models, while we prove the equivalence of
several alternative metrics in a companion paper.Comment: 44 page
A Birthday Repetition Theorem and Complexity of Approximating Dense CSPs
A -birthday repetition of a
two-prover game is a game in which the two provers are sent
random sets of questions from of sizes and respectively.
These two sets are sampled independently uniformly among all sets of questions
of those particular sizes. We prove the following birthday repetition theorem:
when satisfies some mild conditions, decreases exponentially in where is the total number of
questions. Our result positively resolves an open question posted by Aaronson,
Impagliazzo and Moshkovitz (CCC 2014).
As an application of our birthday repetition theorem, we obtain new
fine-grained hardness of approximation results for dense CSPs. Specifically, we
establish a tight trade-off between running time and approximation ratio for
dense CSPs by showing conditional lower bounds, integrality gaps and
approximation algorithms. In particular, for any sufficiently large and for
every , we show the following results:
- We exhibit an -approximation algorithm for dense Max -CSPs
with alphabet size via -level of Sherali-Adams relaxation.
- Through our birthday repetition theorem, we obtain an integrality gap of
for -level Lasserre relaxation for fully-dense Max
-CSP.
- Assuming that there is a constant such that Max 3SAT cannot
be approximated to within of the optimal in sub-exponential
time, our birthday repetition theorem implies that any algorithm that
approximates fully-dense Max -CSP to within a factor takes
time, almost tightly matching the algorithmic
result based on Sherali-Adams relaxation.Comment: 45 page
Extremal results in sparse pseudorandom graphs
Szemer\'edi's regularity lemma is a fundamental tool in extremal
combinatorics. However, the original version is only helpful in studying dense
graphs. In the 1990s, Kohayakawa and R\"odl proved an analogue of Szemer\'edi's
regularity lemma for sparse graphs as part of a general program toward
extending extremal results to sparse graphs. Many of the key applications of
Szemer\'edi's regularity lemma use an associated counting lemma. In order to
prove extensions of these results which also apply to sparse graphs, it
remained a well-known open problem to prove a counting lemma in sparse graphs.
The main advance of this paper lies in a new counting lemma, proved following
the functional approach of Gowers, which complements the sparse regularity
lemma of Kohayakawa and R\"odl, allowing us to count small graphs in regular
subgraphs of a sufficiently pseudorandom graph. We use this to prove sparse
extensions of several well-known combinatorial theorems, including the removal
lemmas for graphs and groups, the Erd\H{o}s-Stone-Simonovits theorem and
Ramsey's theorem. These results extend and improve upon a substantial body of
previous work.Comment: 70 pages, accepted for publication in Adv. Mat
Strongly Refuting Random CSPs Below the Spectral Threshold
Random constraint satisfaction problems (CSPs) are known to exhibit threshold
phenomena: given a uniformly random instance of a CSP with variables and
clauses, there is a value of beyond which the CSP will be
unsatisfiable with high probability. Strong refutation is the problem of
certifying that no variable assignment satisfies more than a constant fraction
of clauses; this is the natural algorithmic problem in the unsatisfiable regime
(when ).
Intuitively, strong refutation should become easier as the clause density
grows, because the contradictions introduced by the random clauses become
more locally apparent. For CSPs such as -SAT and -XOR, there is a
long-standing gap between the clause density at which efficient strong
refutation algorithms are known, , and the
clause density at which instances become unsatisfiable with high probability,
.
In this paper, we give spectral and sum-of-squares algorithms for strongly
refuting random -XOR instances with clause density in time or in
rounds of the sum-of-squares hierarchy, for any
and any integer . Our algorithms provide a smooth
transition between the clause density at which polynomial-time algorithms are
known at , and brute-force refutation at the satisfiability
threshold when . We also leverage our -XOR results to obtain
strong refutation algorithms for SAT (or any other Boolean CSP) at similar
clause densities. Our algorithms match the known sum-of-squares lower bounds
due to Grigoriev and Schonebeck, up to logarithmic factors.
Additionally, we extend our techniques to give new results for certifying
upper bounds on the injective tensor norm of random tensors