Finding a Path is Harder than Finding a Tree

I consider the problem of learning an optimal path graphical model from data and show the problem to be NP-hard for the maximum likelihood and minimum description length approaches and a Bayesian approach. This hardness result holds despite the fact that the problem is a restriction of the polynomially solvable problem of finding the optimal tree graphical model

Lempel-Ziv Factorization May Be Harder Than Computing All Runs

The complexity of computing the Lempel-Ziv factorization and the set of all runs (= maximal repetitions) is studied in the decision tree model of computation over ordered alphabet. It is known that both these problems can be solved by RAM algorithms in $O(n\log\sigma)$ time, where $n$ is the length of the input string and $\sigma$ is the number of distinct letters in it. We prove an $\Omega(n\log\sigma)$ lower bound on the number of comparisons required to construct the Lempel-Ziv factorization and thereby conclude that a popular technique of computation of runs using the Lempel-Ziv factorization cannot achieve an $o(n\log\sigma)$ time bound. In contrast with this, we exhibit an $O(n)$ decision tree algorithm finding all runs in a string. Therefore, in the decision tree model the runs problem is easier than the Lempel-Ziv factorization. Thus we support the conjecture that there is a linear RAM algorithm finding all runs.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures, submitte

On the Complexity of Chore Division

We study the proportional chore division problem where a protocol wants to divide an undesirable object, called chore, among $n$ different players. The goal is to find an allocation such that the cost of the chore assigned to each player be at most $1/n$ of the total cost. This problem is the dual variant of the cake cutting problem in which we want to allocate a desirable object. Edmonds and Pruhs showed that any protocol for the proportional cake cutting must use at least $\Omega(n \log n)$ queries in the worst case, however, finding a lower bound for the proportional chore division remained an interesting open problem. We show that chore division and cake cutting problems are closely related to each other and provide an $\Omega(n \log n)$ lower bound for chore division

Replacement Paths via Row Minima of Concise Matrices

Matrix $M$ is {\em $k$-concise} if the finite entries of each column of $M$ consist of $k$ or less intervals of identical numbers. We give an $O(n+m)$-time algorithm to compute the row minima of any $O(1)$-concise $n\times m$ matrix. Our algorithm yields the first $O(n+m)$-time reductions from the replacement-paths problem on an $n$-node $m$-edge undirected graph (respectively, directed acyclic graph) to the single-source shortest-paths problem on an $O(n)$-node $O(m)$-edge undirected graph (respectively, directed acyclic graph). That is, we prove that the replacement-paths problem is no harder than the single-source shortest-paths problem on undirected graphs and directed acyclic graphs. Moreover, our linear-time reductions lead to the first $O(n+m)$-time algorithms for the replacement-paths problem on the following classes of $n$-node $m$-edge graphs (1) undirected graphs in the word-RAM model of computation, (2) undirected planar graphs, (3) undirected minor-closed graphs, and (4) directed acyclic graphs.Comment: 23 pages, 1 table, 9 figures, accepted to SIAM Journal on Discrete Mathematic