Lower Bounds for the Graph Homomorphism Problem

The graph homomorphism problem (HOM) asks whether the vertices of a given $n$-vertex graph $G$ can be mapped to the vertices of a given $h$-vertex graph $H$ such that each edge of $G$ is mapped to an edge of $H$. The problem generalizes the graph coloring problem and at the same time can be viewed as a special case of the $2$-CSP problem. In this paper, we prove several lower bound for HOM under the Exponential Time Hypothesis (ETH) assumption. The main result is a lower bound $2^{\Omega\left( \frac{n \log h}{\log \log h}\right)}$. This rules out the existence of a single-exponential algorithm and shows that the trivial upper bound $2^{{\mathcal O}(n\log{h})}$ is almost asymptotically tight. We also investigate what properties of graphs $G$ and $H$ make it difficult to solve HOM$(G,H)$. An easy observation is that an ${\mathcal O}(h^n)$ upper bound can be improved to ${\mathcal O}(h^{\operatorname{vc}(G)})$ where $\operatorname{vc}(G)$ is the minimum size of a vertex cover of $G$. The second lower bound $h^{\Omega(\operatorname{vc}(G))}$ shows that the upper bound is asymptotically tight. As to the properties of the "right-hand side" graph $H$, it is known that HOM$(G,H)$ can be solved in time $(f(\Delta(H)))^n$ and $(f(\operatorname{tw}(H)))^n$ where $\Delta(H)$ is the maximum degree of $H$ and $\operatorname{tw}(H)$ is the treewidth of $H$. This gives single-exponential algorithms for graphs of bounded maximum degree or bounded treewidth. Since the chromatic number $\chi(H)$ does not exceed $\operatorname{tw}(H)$ and $\Delta(H)+1$, it is natural to ask whether similar upper bounds with respect to $\chi(H)$ can be obtained. We provide a negative answer to this question by establishing a lower bound $(f(\chi(H)))^n$ for any function $f$. We also observe that similar lower bounds can be obtained for locally injective homomorphisms.Comment: 19 page

Exact Algorithm for Graph Homomorphism and Locally Injective Graph Homomorphism

For graphs $G$ and $H$, a homomorphism from $G$ to $H$ is a function $\varphi \colon V(G) \to V(H)$, which maps vertices adjacent in $G$ to adjacent vertices of $H$. A homomorphism is locally injective if no two vertices with a common neighbor are mapped to a single vertex in $H$. Many cases of graph homomorphism and locally injective graph homomorphism are NP-complete, so there is little hope to design polynomial-time algorithms for them. In this paper we present an algorithm for graph homomorphism and locally injective homomorphism working in time $\mathcal{O}^*((b + 2)^{|V(G)|})$, where $b$ is the bandwidth of the complement of $H$

From the Ising and Potts models to the general graph homomorphism polynomial

In this note we study some of the properties of the generating polynomial for homomorphisms from a graph to at complete weighted graph on $q$ vertices. We discuss how this polynomial relates to a long list of other well known graph polynomials and the partition functions for different spin models, many of which are specialisations of the homomorphism polynomial. We also identify the smallest graphs which are not determined by their homomorphism polynomials for $q=2$ and $q=3$ and compare this with the corresponding minimal examples for the $U$-polynomial, which generalizes the well known Tutte-polynomal.Comment: V2. Extended versio