On the Parameterized Intractability of Monadic Second-Order Logic

One of Courcelle's celebrated results states that if C is a class of graphs of bounded tree-width, then model-checking for monadic second order logic (MSO_2) is fixed-parameter tractable (fpt) on C by linear time parameterized algorithms, where the parameter is the tree-width plus the size of the formula. An immediate question is whether this is best possible or whether the result can be extended to classes of unbounded tree-width. In this paper we show that in terms of tree-width, the theorem cannot be extended much further. More specifically, we show that if C is a class of graphs which is closed under colourings and satisfies certain constructibility conditions and is such that the tree-width of C is not bounded by \log^{84} n then MSO_2-model checking is not fpt unless SAT can be solved in sub-exponential time. If the tree-width of C is not poly-logarithmically bounded, then MSO_2-model checking is not fpt unless all problems in the polynomial-time hierarchy can be solved in sub-exponential time

Clique trees of infinite locally finite chordal graphs

We investigate clique trees of infinite locally finite chordal graphs. Our main contribution is a bijection between the set of clique trees and the product of local finite families of finite trees. Even more, the edges of a clique tree are in bijection with the edges of the corresponding collection of finite trees. This allows us to enumerate the clique trees of a chordal graph and extend various classic characterisations of clique trees to the infinite setting

On some special classes of contact B0B_0-VPG graphs

A graph $G$ is a $B_0$-VPG graph if one can associate a path on a rectangular grid with each vertex such that two vertices are adjacent if and only if the corresponding paths intersect at at least one grid-point. A graph $G$ is a contact $B_0$-VPG graph if it is a $B_0$-VPG graph admitting a representation with no two paths crossing and no two paths sharing an edge of the grid. In this paper, we present a minimal forbidden induced subgraph characterisation of contact $B_0$-VPG graphs within four special graph classes: chordal graphs, tree-cographs, $P_4$-tidy graphs and $P_5$-free graphs. Moreover, we present a polynomial-time algorithm for recognising chordal contact $B_0$-VPG graphs.Comment: 34 pages, 15 figure