34,842 research outputs found
Note on Perfect Forests in Digraphs
A spanning subgraph of a graph is called {\em perfect} if is a
forest, the degree of each vertex in is odd, and each tree of
is an induced subgraph of . Alex Scott (Graphs \& Combin., 2001) proved
that every connected graph contains a perfect forest if and only if has
an even number of vertices. We consider four generalizations to directed graphs
of the concept of a perfect forest. While the problem of existence of the most
straightforward one is NP-hard, for the three others this problem is
polynomial-time solvable. Moreover, every digraph with only one strong
component contains a directed forest of each of these three generalization
types. One of our results extends Scott's theorem to digraphs in a non-trivial
way
Note on Perfect Forests
A spanning subgraph of a graph is called perfect if is a forest,
the degree of each vertex in is odd, and each tree of is
an induced subgraph of . We provide a short proof of the following theorem
of A.D. Scott (Graphs & Combin., 2001): a connected graph contains a
perfect forest if and only if has an even number of vertices
Burning a Graph is Hard
Graph burning is a model for the spread of social contagion. The burning
number is a graph parameter associated with graph burning that measures the
speed of the spread of contagion in a graph; the lower the burning number, the
faster the contagion spreads. We prove that the corresponding graph decision
problem is \textbf{NP}-complete when restricted to acyclic graphs with maximum
degree three, spider graphs and path-forests. We provide polynomial time
algorithms for finding the burning number of spider graphs and path-forests if
the number of arms and components, respectively, are fixed.Comment: 20 Pages, 4 figures, presented at GRASTA-MAC 2015 (October 19-23rd,
2015, Montr\'eal, Canada
Vertex Cover Kernelization Revisited: Upper and Lower Bounds for a Refined Parameter
An important result in the study of polynomial-time preprocessing shows that
there is an algorithm which given an instance (G,k) of Vertex Cover outputs an
equivalent instance (G',k') in polynomial time with the guarantee that G' has
at most 2k' vertices (and thus O((k')^2) edges) with k' <= k. Using the
terminology of parameterized complexity we say that k-Vertex Cover has a kernel
with 2k vertices. There is complexity-theoretic evidence that both 2k vertices
and Theta(k^2) edges are optimal for the kernel size. In this paper we consider
the Vertex Cover problem with a different parameter, the size fvs(G) of a
minimum feedback vertex set for G. This refined parameter is structurally
smaller than the parameter k associated to the vertex covering number vc(G)
since fvs(G) <= vc(G) and the difference can be arbitrarily large. We give a
kernel for Vertex Cover with a number of vertices that is cubic in fvs(G): an
instance (G,X,k) of Vertex Cover, where X is a feedback vertex set for G, can
be transformed in polynomial time into an equivalent instance (G',X',k') such
that |V(G')| <= 2k and |V(G')| <= O(|X'|^3). A similar result holds when the
feedback vertex set X is not given along with the input. In sharp contrast we
show that the Weighted Vertex Cover problem does not have a polynomial kernel
when parameterized by the cardinality of a given vertex cover of the graph
unless NP is in coNP/poly and the polynomial hierarchy collapses to the third
level.Comment: Published in "Theory of Computing Systems" as an Open Access
publicatio
Spanning trees of 3-uniform hypergraphs
Masbaum and Vaintrob's "Pfaffian matrix tree theorem" implies that counting
spanning trees of a 3-uniform hypergraph (abbreviated to 3-graph) can be done
in polynomial time for a class of "3-Pfaffian" 3-graphs, comparable to and
related to the class of Pfaffian graphs. We prove a complexity result for
recognizing a 3-Pfaffian 3-graph and describe two large classes of 3-Pfaffian
3-graphs -- one of these is given by a forbidden subgraph characterization
analogous to Little's for bipartite Pfaffian graphs, and the other consists of
a class of partial Steiner triple systems for which the property of being
3-Pfaffian can be reduced to the property of an associated graph being
Pfaffian. We exhibit an infinite set of partial Steiner triple systems that are
not 3-Pfaffian, none of which can be reduced to any other by deletion or
contraction of triples.
We also find some necessary or sufficient conditions for the existence of a
spanning tree of a 3-graph (much more succinct than can be obtained by the
currently fastest polynomial-time algorithm of Gabow and Stallmann for finding
a spanning tree) and a superexponential lower bound on the number of spanning
trees of a Steiner triple system.Comment: 34 pages, 9 figure
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