1,005 research outputs found
Phase Transitions and Backbones of the Asymmetric Traveling Salesman Problem
In recent years, there has been much interest in phase transitions of
combinatorial problems. Phase transitions have been successfully used to
analyze combinatorial optimization problems, characterize their typical-case
features and locate the hardest problem instances. In this paper, we study
phase transitions of the asymmetric Traveling Salesman Problem (ATSP), an
NP-hard combinatorial optimization problem that has many real-world
applications. Using random instances of up to 1,500 cities in which intercity
distances are uniformly distributed, we empirically show that many properties
of the problem, including the optimal tour cost and backbone size, experience
sharp transitions as the precision of intercity distances increases across a
critical value. Our experimental results on the costs of the ATSP tours and
assignment problem agree with the theoretical result that the asymptotic cost
of assignment problem is pi ^2 /6 the number of cities goes to infinity. In
addition, we show that the average computational cost of the well-known
branch-and-bound subtour elimination algorithm for the problem also exhibits a
thrashing behavior, transitioning from easy to difficult as the distance
precision increases. These results answer positively an open question regarding
the existence of phase transitions in the ATSP, and provide guidance on how
difficult ATSP problem instances should be generated
A near-optimal approximation algorithm for Asymmetric TSP on embedded graphs
We present a near-optimal polynomial-time approximation algorithm for the
asymmetric traveling salesman problem for graphs of bounded orientable or
non-orientable genus. Our algorithm achieves an approximation factor of O(f(g))
on graphs with genus g, where f(n) is the best approximation factor achievable
in polynomial time on arbitrary n-vertex graphs. In particular, the
O(log(n)/loglog(n))-approximation algorithm for general graphs by Asadpour et
al. [SODA 2010] immediately implies an O(log(g)/loglog(g))-approximation
algorithm for genus-g graphs. Our result improves the
O(sqrt(g)*log(g))-approximation algorithm of Oveis Gharan and Saberi [SODA
2011], which applies only to graphs with orientable genus g; ours is the first
approximation algorithm for graphs with bounded non-orientable genus.
Moreover, using recent progress on approximating the genus of a graph, our
O(log(g) / loglog(g))-approximation can be implemented even without an
embedding when the input graph has bounded degree. In contrast, the
O(sqrt(g)*log(g))-approximation algorithm of Oveis Gharan and Saberi requires a
genus-g embedding as part of the input.
Finally, our techniques lead to a O(1)-approximation algorithm for ATSP on
graphs of genus g, with running time 2^O(g)*n^O(1)
Approximation Algorithms for the Asymmetric Traveling Salesman Problem : Describing two recent methods
The paper provides a description of the two recent approximation algorithms
for the Asymmetric Traveling Salesman Problem, giving the intuitive description
of the works of Feige-Singh[1] and Asadpour et.al\ [2].\newline [1] improves
the previous approximation algorithm, by improving the constant
from 0.84 to 0.66 and modifying the work of Kaplan et. al\ [3] and also shows
an efficient reduction from ATSPP to ATSP. Combining both the results, they
finally establish an approximation ratio of for ATSPP,\ considering a small ,\ improving the
work of Chekuri and Pal.[4]\newline Asadpour et.al, in their seminal work\ [2],
gives an randomized algorithm for
the ATSP, by symmetrizing and modifying the solution of the Held-Karp
relaxation problem and then proving an exponential family distribution for
probabilistically constructing a maximum entropy spanning tree from a spanning
tree polytope and then finally defining the thin-ness property and transforming
a thin spanning tree into an Eulerian walk.\ The optimization methods used in\
[2] are quite elegant and the approximation ratio could further be improved, by
manipulating the thin-ness of the cuts.Comment: 12 page
New Inapproximability Bounds for TSP
In this paper, we study the approximability of the metric Traveling Salesman
Problem (TSP) and prove new explicit inapproximability bounds for that problem.
The best up to now known hardness of approximation bounds were 185/184 for the
symmetric case (due to Lampis) and 117/116 for the asymmetric case (due to
Papadimitriou and Vempala). We construct here two new bounded occurrence CSP
reductions which improve these bounds to 123/122 and 75/74, respectively. The
latter bound is the first improvement in more than a decade for the case of the
asymmetric TSP. One of our main tools, which may be of independent interest, is
a new construction of a bounded degree wheel amplifier used in the proof of our
results
Approximability of Connected Factors
Finding a d-regular spanning subgraph (or d-factor) of a graph is easy by
Tutte's reduction to the matching problem. By the same reduction, it is easy to
find a minimal or maximal d-factor of a graph. However, if we require that the
d-factor is connected, these problems become NP-hard - finding a minimal
connected 2-factor is just the traveling salesman problem (TSP).
Given a complete graph with edge weights that satisfy the triangle
inequality, we consider the problem of finding a minimal connected -factor.
We give a 3-approximation for all and improve this to an
(r+1)-approximation for even d, where r is the approximation ratio of the TSP.
This yields a 2.5-approximation for even d. The same algorithm yields an
(r+1)-approximation for the directed version of the problem, where r is the
approximation ratio of the asymmetric TSP. We also show that none of these
minimization problems can be approximated better than the corresponding TSP.
Finally, for the decision problem of deciding whether a given graph contains
a connected d-factor, we extend known hardness results.Comment: To appear in the proceedings of WAOA 201
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