1,078 research outputs found
Ramsey-type theorems for metric spaces with applications to online problems
A nearly logarithmic lower bound on the randomized competitive ratio for the
metrical task systems problem is presented. This implies a similar lower bound
for the extensively studied k-server problem. The proof is based on Ramsey-type
theorems for metric spaces, that state that every metric space contains a large
subspace which is approximately a hierarchically well-separated tree (and in
particular an ultrametric). These Ramsey-type theorems may be of independent
interest.Comment: Fix an error in the metadata. 31 pages, 0 figures. Preliminary
version in FOCS '01. To be published in J. Comput. System Sc
On Metric Ramsey-type Dichotomies
The classical Ramsey theorem, states that every graph contains either a large
clique or a large independent set. Here we investigate similar dichotomic
phenomena in the context of finite metric spaces. Namely, we prove statements
of the form "Every finite metric space contains a large subspace that is nearly
quilateral or far from being equilateral". We consider two distinct
interpretations for being "far from equilateral". Proximity among metric spaces
is quantified through the metric distortion D. We provide tight asymptotic
answers for these problems. In particular, we show that a phase transition
occurs at D=2.Comment: 14 pages, 0 figure
Metric Cotype
We introduce the notion of metric cotype, a property of metric
spaces related to a property of normed spaces, called Rademacher
cotype. Apart from settling a long standing open problem in metric
geometry, this property is used to prove the following dichotomy: A
family of metric spaces F is either almost universal (i.e., contains
any finite metric space with any distortion > 1), or there exists
α > 0, and arbitrarily large n-point metrics whose distortion when
embedded in any member of F is at least Ω((log n)^α). The same
property is also used to prove strong non-embeddability theorems
of L_q into L_p, when q > max{2,p}. Finally we use metric cotype
to obtain a new type of isoperimetric inequality on the discrete
torus
Multi-Embedding of Metric Spaces
Metric embedding has become a common technique in the design of algorithms.
Its applicability is often dependent on how high the embedding's distortion is.
For example, embedding finite metric space into trees may require linear
distortion as a function of its size. Using probabilistic metric embeddings,
the bound on the distortion reduces to logarithmic in the size.
We make a step in the direction of bypassing the lower bound on the
distortion in terms of the size of the metric. We define "multi-embeddings" of
metric spaces in which a point is mapped onto a set of points, while keeping
the target metric of polynomial size and preserving the distortion of paths.
The distortion obtained with such multi-embeddings into ultrametrics is at most
O(log Delta loglog Delta) where Delta is the aspect ratio of the metric. In
particular, for expander graphs, we are able to obtain constant distortion
embeddings into trees in contrast with the Omega(log n) lower bound for all
previous notions of embeddings.
We demonstrate the algorithmic application of the new embeddings for two
optimization problems: group Steiner tree and metrical task systems
Embedding Metrics into Ultrametrics and Graphs into Spanning Trees with Constant Average Distortion
This paper addresses the basic question of how well can a tree approximate
distances of a metric space or a graph. Given a graph, the problem of
constructing a spanning tree in a graph which strongly preserves distances in
the graph is a fundamental problem in network design. We present scaling
distortion embeddings where the distortion scales as a function of ,
with the guarantee that for each the distortion of a fraction
of all pairs is bounded accordingly. Such a bound implies, in
particular, that the \emph{average distortion} and -distortions are
small. Specifically, our embeddings have \emph{constant} average distortion and
-distortion. This follows from the following
results: we prove that any metric space embeds into an ultrametric with scaling
distortion . For the graph setting we prove that any
weighted graph contains a spanning tree with scaling distortion
. These bounds are tight even for embedding in arbitrary
trees.
For probabilistic embedding into spanning trees we prove a scaling distortion
of , which implies \emph{constant}
-distortion for every fixed .Comment: Extended abstrat apears in SODA 200
Euclidean quotients of finite metric spaces
This paper is devoted to the study of quotients of finite metric spaces. The
basic type of question we ask is: Given a finite metric space M, what is the
largest quotient of (a subset of) M which well embeds into Hilbert space. We
obtain asymptotically tight bounds for these questions, and prove that they
exhibit phase transitions. We also study the analogous problem for embedings
into l_p, and the particular case of the hypercube.Comment: 36 pages, 0 figures. To appear in Advances in Mathematic
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