1,288 research outputs found
Parameterized Complexity Results for General Factors in Bipartite Graphs with an Application to Constraint Programming
The NP-hard general factor problem asks, given a graph and for each vertex a
list of integers, whether the graph has a spanning subgraph where each vertex
has a degree that belongs to its assigned list. The problem remains NP-hard
even if the given graph is bipartite with partition U+V, and each vertex in U
is assigned the list {1}; this subproblem appears in the context of constraint
programming as the consistency problem for the extended global cardinality
constraint. We show that this subproblem is fixed-parameter tractable when
parameterized by the size of the second partite set V. More generally, we show
that the general factor problem for bipartite graphs, parameterized by |V|, is
fixed-parameter tractable as long as all vertices in U are assigned lists of
length 1, but becomes W[1]-hard if vertices in U are assigned lists of length
at most 2. We establish fixed-parameter tractability by reducing the problem
instance to a bounded number of acyclic instances, each of which can be solved
in polynomial time by dynamic programming.Comment: Full version of a paper that appeared in preliminary form in the
proceedings of IPEC'1
The Graph Motif problem parameterized by the structure of the input graph
The Graph Motif problem was introduced in 2006 in the context of biological
networks. It consists of deciding whether or not a multiset of colors occurs in
a connected subgraph of a vertex-colored graph. Graph Motif has been mostly
analyzed from the standpoint of parameterized complexity. The main parameters
which came into consideration were the size of the multiset and the number of
colors. Though, in the many applications of Graph Motif, the input graph
originates from real-life and has structure. Motivated by this prosaic
observation, we systematically study its complexity relatively to graph
structural parameters. For a wide range of parameters, we give new or improved
FPT algorithms, or show that the problem remains intractable. For the FPT
cases, we also give some kernelization lower bounds as well as some ETH-based
lower bounds on the worst case running time. Interestingly, we establish that
Graph Motif is W[1]-hard (while in W[P]) for parameter max leaf number, which
is, to the best of our knowledge, the first problem to behave this way.Comment: 24 pages, accepted in DAM, conference version in IPEC 201
Parameterized Rural Postman Problem
The Directed Rural Postman Problem (DRPP) can be formulated as follows: given
a strongly connected directed multigraph with nonnegative integral
weights on the arcs, a subset of and a nonnegative integer ,
decide whether has a closed directed walk containing every arc of and
of total weight at most . Let be the number of weakly connected
components in the the subgraph of induced by . Sorge et al. (2012) ask
whether the DRPP is fixed-parameter tractable (FPT) when parameterized by ,
i.e., whether there is an algorithm of running time where is a
function of only and the notation suppresses polynomial factors.
Sorge et al. (2012) note that this question is of significant practical
relevance and has been open for more than thirty years. Using an algebraic
approach, we prove that DRPP has a randomized algorithm of running time
when is bounded by a polynomial in the number of vertices in
. We also show that the same result holds for the undirected version of
DRPP, where is a connected undirected multigraph
A Tight Lower Bound for Counting Hamiltonian Cycles via Matrix Rank
For even , the matchings connectivity matrix encodes which
pairs of perfect matchings on vertices form a single cycle. Cygan et al.
(STOC 2013) showed that the rank of over is
and used this to give an
time algorithm for counting Hamiltonian cycles modulo on graphs of
pathwidth . The same authors complemented their algorithm by an
essentially tight lower bound under the Strong Exponential Time Hypothesis
(SETH). This bound crucially relied on a large permutation submatrix within
, which enabled a "pattern propagation" commonly used in previous
related lower bounds, as initiated by Lokshtanov et al. (SODA 2011).
We present a new technique for a similar pattern propagation when only a
black-box lower bound on the asymptotic rank of is given; no
stronger structural insights such as the existence of large permutation
submatrices in are needed. Given appropriate rank bounds, our
technique yields lower bounds for counting Hamiltonian cycles (also modulo
fixed primes ) parameterized by pathwidth.
To apply this technique, we prove that the rank of over the
rationals is . We also show that the rank of
over is for any prime
and even for some primes.
As a consequence, we obtain that Hamiltonian cycles cannot be counted in time
for any unless SETH fails. This
bound is tight due to a time algorithm by Bodlaender et
al. (ICALP 2013). Under SETH, we also obtain that Hamiltonian cycles cannot be
counted modulo primes in time , indicating
that the modulus can affect the complexity in intricate ways.Comment: improved lower bounds modulo primes, improved figures, to appear in
SODA 201
Lower Bounds for the Graph Homomorphism Problem
The graph homomorphism problem (HOM) asks whether the vertices of a given
-vertex graph can be mapped to the vertices of a given -vertex graph
such that each edge of is mapped to an edge of . The problem
generalizes the graph coloring problem and at the same time can be viewed as a
special case of the -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 .
This rules out the existence of a single-exponential algorithm and shows that
the trivial upper bound is almost asymptotically
tight.
We also investigate what properties of graphs and make it difficult
to solve HOM. An easy observation is that an upper
bound can be improved to where
is the minimum size of a vertex cover of . The second
lower bound shows that the upper bound is
asymptotically tight. As to the properties of the "right-hand side" graph ,
it is known that HOM can be solved in time and
where is the maximum degree of
and is the treewidth of . This gives
single-exponential algorithms for graphs of bounded maximum degree or bounded
treewidth. Since the chromatic number does not exceed
and , it is natural to ask whether similar
upper bounds with respect to can be obtained. We provide a negative
answer to this question by establishing a lower bound for any
function . We also observe that similar lower bounds can be obtained for
locally injective homomorphisms.Comment: 19 page
Faster Algorithms For Vertex Partitioning Problems Parameterized by Clique-width
Many NP-hard problems, such as Dominating Set, are FPT parameterized by
clique-width. For graphs of clique-width given with a -expression,
Dominating Set can be solved in time. However, no FPT algorithm
is known for computing an optimal -expression. For a graph of clique-width
, if we rely on known algorithms to compute a -expression via
rank-width and then solving Dominating Set using the -expression,
the above algorithm will only give a runtime of . There
have been results which overcome this exponential jump; the best known
algorithm can solve Dominating Set in time by avoiding
constructing a -expression [Bui-Xuan, Telle, and Vatshelle. Fast dynamic
programming for locally checkable vertex subset and vertex partitioning
problems. Theoret. Comput. Sci., 2013. doi:10.1016/j.tcs.2013.01.009]. We
improve this to . Indeed, we show that for a graph of
clique-width , a large class of domination and partitioning problems
(LC-VSP), including Dominating Set, can be solved in . Our main tool is a variant of rank-width using the rank of a -
matrix over the rational field instead of the binary field.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figure
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