A general framework for coloring problems: old results, new results, and open problems

In this survey paper we present a general framework for coloring problems that was introduced in a joint paper which the author presented at WG2003. We show how a number of different types of coloring problems, most of which have been motivated from frequency assignment, fit into this framework. We give a survey of the existing results, mainly based on and strongly biased by joint work of the author with several different groups of coauthors, include some new results, and discuss several open problems for each of the variants

Parameterized complexity of coloring problems: Treewidth versus vertex cover

AbstractWe compare the fixed parameter complexity of various variants of coloring problems (including List Coloring, Precoloring Extension, Equitable Coloring, L(p,1)-Labeling and Channel Assignment) when parameterized by treewidth and by vertex cover number. In most (but not all) cases we conclude that parametrization by the vertex cover number provides a significant drop in the complexity of the problems

Parameterized Algorithms for Graph Partitioning Problems

In parameterized complexity, a problem instance (I, k) consists of an input I and an extra parameter k. The parameter k usually a positive integer indicating the size of the solution or the structure of the input. A computational problem is called fixed-parameter tractable (FPT) if there is an algorithm for the problem with time complexity O(f(k).nc ), where f(k) is a function dependent only on the input parameter k, n is the size of the input and c is a constant. The existence of such an algorithm means that the problem is tractable for fixed values of the parameter. In this thesis, we provide parameterized algorithms for the following NP-hard graph partitioning problems: (i) Matching Cut Problem: In an undirected graph, a matching cut is a partition of vertices into two non-empty sets such that the edges across the sets induce a matching. The matching cut problem is the problem of deciding whether a given graph has a matching cut. The Matching Cut problem is expressible in monadic second-order logic (MSOL). The MSOL formulation, together with Courcelle’s theorem implies linear time solvability on graphs with bounded tree-width. However, this approach leads to a running time of f(||ϕ||, t) · n, where ||ϕ|| is the length of the MSOL formula, t is the tree-width of the graph and n is the number of vertices of the graph. The dependency of f(||ϕ||, t) on ||ϕ|| can be as bad as a tower of exponentials. In this thesis we give a single exponential algorithm for the Matching Cut problem with tree-width alone as the parameter. The running time of the algorithm is 2O(t) · n. This answers an open question posed by Kratsch and Le [Theoretical Computer Science, 2016]. We also show the fixed parameter tractability of the Matching Cut problem when parameterized by neighborhood diversity or other structural parameters. (ii) H-Free Coloring Problems: In an undirected graph G for a fixed graph H, the H-Free q-Coloring problem asks to color the vertices of the graph G using at most q colors such that none of the color classes contain H as an induced subgraph. That is every color class is H-free. This is a generalization of the classical q-Coloring problem, which is to color the vertices of the graph using at most q colors such that no pair of adjacent vertices are of the same color. The H-Free Chromatic Number is the minimum number of colors required to H-free color the graph. For a fixed q, the H-Free q-Coloring problem is expressible in monadic secondorder logic (MSOL). The MSOL formulation leads to an algorithm with time complexity f(||ϕ||, t) · n, where ||ϕ|| is the length of the MSOL formula, t is the tree-width of the graph and n is the number of vertices of the graph. In this thesis we present the following explicit combinatorial algorithms for H-Free Coloring problems: • An O(q O(t r ) · n) time algorithm for the general H-Free q-Coloring problem, where r = |V (H)|. • An O(2t+r log t · n) time algorithm for Kr-Free 2-Coloring problem, where Kr is a complete graph on r vertices. The above implies an O(t O(t r ) · n log t) time algorithm to compute the H-Free Chromatic Number for graphs with tree-width at most t. Therefore H-Free Chromatic Number is FPT with respect to tree-width. We also address a variant of H-Free q-Coloring problem which we call H-(Subgraph)Free q-Coloring problem, which is to color the vertices of the graph such that none of the color classes contain H as a subgraph (need not be induced). We present the following algorithms for H-(Subgraph)Free q-Coloring problems. • An O(q O(t r ) · n) time algorithm for the general H-(Subgraph)Free q-Coloring problem, which leads to an O(t O(t r ) · n log t) time algorithm to compute the H- (Subgraph)Free Chromatic Number for graphs with tree-width at most t. • An O(2O(t 2 ) · n) time algorithm for C4-(Subgraph)Free 2-Coloring, where C4 is a cycle on 4 vertices. • An O(2O(t r−2 ) · n) time algorithm for {Kr\e}-(Subgraph)Free 2-Coloring, where Kr\e is a graph obtained by removing an edge from Kr. • An O(2O((tr2 ) r−2 ) · n) time algorithm for Cr-(Subgraph)Free 2-Coloring problem, where Cr is a cycle of length r. (iii) Happy Coloring Problems: In a vertex-colored graph, an edge is happy if its endpoints have the same color. Similarly, a vertex is happy if all its incident edges are happy. we consider the algorithmic aspects of the following Maximum Happy Edges (k-MHE) problem: given a partially k-colored graph G, find an extended full k-coloring of G such that the number of happy edges are maximized. When we want to maximize the number of happy vertices, the problem is known as Maximum Happy Vertices (k-MHV). We show that both k-MHE and k-MHV admit polynomial-time algorithms for trees. We show that k-MHE admits a kernel of size k + `, where ` is the natural parameter, the number of happy edges. We show the hardness of k-MHE and k-MHV for some special graphs such as split graphs and bipartite graphs. We show that both k-MHE and k-MHV are tractable for graphs with bounded tree-width and graphs with bounded neighborhood diversity. vii In the last part of the thesis we present an algorithm for the Replacement Paths Problem which is defined as follows: Let G (|V (G)| = n and |E(G)| = m) be an undirected graph with positive edge weights. Let PG(s, t) be a shortest s − t path in G. Let l be the number of edges in PG(s, t). The Edge Replacement Path problem is to compute a shortest s − t path in G\{e}, for every edge e in PG(s, t). The Node Replacement Path problem is to compute a shortest s−t path in G\{v}, for every vertex v in PG(s, t). We present an O(TSP T (G) + m + l 2 ) time and O(m + l 2 ) space algorithm for both the problems, where TSP T (G) is the asymptotic time to compute a single source shortest path tree in G. The proposed algorithm is simple and easy to implement

Backbone colorings for networks: tree and path backbones

We introduce and study backbone colorings, a variation on classical vertex colorings: Given a graph $G=(V,E)$ and a spanning subgraph $H$ of $G$ (the backbone of $G$), a backbone coloring for $G$ and $H$ is a proper vertex coloring $V\rightarrow \{1,2,\ldots\}$ of $G$ in which the colors assigned to adjacent vertices in $H$ differ by at least two. We study the cases where the backbone is either a spanning tree or a spanning path

Reconfiguring Graph Colorings

Graph coloring has been studied for a long time and continues to receive interest within the research community \cite{kubale2004graph}. It has applications in scheduling \cite{daniel2004graph}, timetables, and compiler register allocation \cite{lewis2015guide}. The most popular variant of graph coloring, k-coloring, can be thought of as an assignment of $k$ colors to the vertices of a graph such that adjacent vertices are assigned different colors. Reconfiguration problems, typically defined on the solution space of search problems, broadly ask whether one solution can be transformed to another solution using step-by-step transformations, when constrained to one or more specific transformation steps \cite{van2013complexity}. One well-studied reconfiguration problem is the problem of deciding whether one k-coloring can be transformed to another k-coloring by changing the color of one vertex at a time, while always maintaining a k-coloring at each step. We consider two variants of graph coloring: acyclic coloring and equitable coloring, and their corresponding reconfiguration problems. A k-acylic coloring is a k-coloring where there are more than two colors used by the vertices of each cycle, and a k-equitable coloring is a k-coloring such that each color class, which is defined as the set of all vertices with a particular color, is nearly the same size as all others. We show that reconfiguration of acyclic colorings is PSPACE-hard, and that for non-bipartite graphs with chromatic number 3 there exist two k-acylic colorings $f_s$ and $f_e$ such that there is no sequence of transformations that can transform $f_s$ to $f_e$. We also consider the problem of whether two k-acylic colorings can be transformed to each other in at most $\ell$ steps, and show that it is in XP, which is the class of algorithms that run in time $O(n^{f(k)})$ for some computable function $f$ and parameter $k$, where in this case the parameter is defined to be the length of the reconfiguration sequence plus the length of the longest induced cycle. We also show that the reconfiguration of equitable colorings is PSPACE-hard and W[1]-hard with respect to the number of vertices with the same color. We give polynomial-time algorithms for Reconfiguration of Equitable Colorings when the number of colors used is two and also for paths when the number of colors used is three

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

LIPIcs, Volume 248, ISAAC 2022, Complete Volume

LIPIcs, Volume 248, ISAAC 2022, Complete Volum

Knotenfärbungen mit Abstandsbedingungen

Knotenfärbungen mit Abstandsbedingungen sind graphentheoretische Konzepte, motiviert durch das praktische Problem der Frequenzzuweisung in Mobilfunknetzen. In der Arbeit werden verschiedene Varianten solcher Färbungen vorgestellt. Für (Listen-)Färbungen mit einer beliebigen Anzahl r von Abstandsbedingungen werden allgemeine Eigenschaften und Schranken für die benötigte Anzahl von Farben bewiesen. Anschließend wird der Spezialfall r=2 behandelt. Färbungen mit zwei Abstandsbedingungen - die sogenannten L(d,s)-Labellings - werden für eine Reihe von Graphenklassen untersucht, u.a. für reguläre Parkettierungen, Weg- und Kreispotenzen und Graphen mit Durchmesser 2. Die Listenversion dieser Färbungen - die sogenannten L(d,s)-List Labellings - werden für Wege, Sterne, Kreise und Kakteen betrachtet. Ferner werden Untersuchungen zum Zusammenhang von L(2,1)-Labellings und L(2,1)-List Labellings bei speziellen Bäumen durchgeführt