24 research outputs found
Network Design Problems with Bounded Distances via Shallow-Light Steiner Trees
In a directed graph with non-correlated edge lengths and costs, the
\emph{network design problem with bounded distances} asks for a cost-minimal
spanning subgraph subject to a length bound for all node pairs. We give a
bi-criteria -approximation for this
problem. This improves on the currently best known linear approximation bound,
at the cost of violating the distance bound by a factor of at
most~.
In the course of proving this result, the related problem of \emph{directed
shallow-light Steiner trees} arises as a subproblem. In the context of directed
graphs, approximations to this problem have been elusive. We present the first
non-trivial result by proposing a
-ap\-proxi\-ma\-tion, where are the
terminals.
Finally, we show how to apply our results to obtain an
-approximation for
\emph{light-weight directed -spanners}. For this, no non-trivial
approximation algorithm has been known before. All running times depends on
and and are polynomial in for any fixed
Hypergraph Representation via Axis-Aligned Point-Subspace Cover
We propose a new representation of -partite, -uniform hypergraphs (i.e.
a hypergraph with a partition of vertices into parts such that each
hyperedge contains exactly one vertex of each type; we call them
-hypergraphs for short) by a finite set of points in and
a parameter . Each point in is covered by
many axis-aligned affine -dimensional subspaces of , which
we call -subspaces for brevity. We interpret each point in as a
hyperedge that contains each of the covering -subspaces as a vertex. The
class of -hypergraphs is the class of -hypergraphs that can be
represented in this way, where . The resulting classes of
hypergraphs are fairly rich: Every -hypergraph is a -hypergraph. On
the other hand, -hypergraphs form a proper subclass of the class of
all -hypergraphs for .
In this paper we give a natural structural characterization of
-hypergraphs based on vertex cuts. This characterization leads to a
polynomial-time recognition algorithm that decides for a given
-hypergraph whether or not it is a -hypergraph and that
computes a representation if existing. We assume that the dimension is
constant and that the partitioning of the vertex set is prescribed
New Algorithms for Maximum Disjoint Paths Based on Tree-Likeness
We study the classical NP-hard problems of finding maximum-size subsets from given sets of k terminal pairs that can be routed via edge-disjoint paths (MaxEDP) or node-disjoint paths (MaxNDP) in a given graph. The approximability of MaxEDP/NDP is currently not well understood; the best known lower bound is Omega(log^{1/2 - varepsilon} n), assuming NP not subseteq ZPTIME(n^{poly log n}). This constitutes a significant gap to the best known approximation upper bound of O(n^1/2) due to Chekuri et al. (2006) and closing this gap is currently one of the big open problems in approximation algorithms. In their seminal paper, Raghavan and Thompson (Combinatorica, 1987) introduce the technique of randomized rounding for LPs; their technique gives an O(1)-approximation when edges (or nodes) may be used by O(log n/log log n) paths.
In this paper, we strengthen the above fundamental results. We provide new bounds formulated in terms of the feedback vertex set number r of a graph, which measures its vertex deletion distance to a forest. In particular, we obtain the following.
- For MaxEDP, we give an O(r^0.5 log^1.5 kr)-approximation algorithm. As r<=n, up to logarithmic factors, our result strengthens the best known ratio O(n^0.5) due to Chekuri et al.
- Further, we show how to route Omega(opt) pairs with congestion O(log(kr)/log log(kr)), strengthening the bound obtained by the classic approach of Raghavan and Thompson.
- For MaxNDP, we give an algorithm that gives the optimal answer in time (k+r)^O(r)n. This is a substantial improvement on the run time of 2^kr^O(r)n, which can be obtained via an algorithm by Scheffler.
We complement these positive results by proving that MaxEDP is NP-hard even for r=1, and MaxNDP is W[1]-hard for parameter r. This shows that neither problem is fixed-parameter tractable in r unless FPT = W[1] and that our approximability results are relevant even for very small constant values of r
Polylogarithmic Approximation for Generalized Minimum Manhattan Networks
Given a set of terminals, which are points in -dimensional Euclidean
space, the minimum Manhattan network problem (MMN) asks for a minimum-length
rectilinear network that connects each pair of terminals by a Manhattan path,
that is, a path consisting of axis-parallel segments whose total length equals
the pair's Manhattan distance. Even for , the problem is NP-hard, but
constant-factor approximations are known. For , the problem is
APX-hard; it is known to admit, for any \eps > 0, an
O(n^\eps)-approximation.
In the generalized minimum Manhattan network problem (GMMN), we are given a
set of terminal pairs, and the goal is to find a minimum-length
rectilinear network such that each pair in is connected by a Manhattan
path. GMMN is a generalization of both MMN and the well-known rectilinear
Steiner arborescence problem (RSA). So far, only special cases of GMMN have
been considered.
We present an -approximation algorithm for GMMN (and, hence,
MMN) in dimensions and an -approximation algorithm for 2D.
We show that an existing -approximation algorithm for RSA in 2D
generalizes easily to dimensions.Comment: 14 pages, 5 figures; added appendix and figure
Brief Announcement: Approximation Schemes for Geometric Coverage Problems
In this announcement, we show that the classical Maximum Coverage problem (MC) admits a PTAS via local search in essentially all cases where the corresponding instances of Set Cover (SC) admit a PTAS via the local search approach by Mustafa and Ray [Nabil H. Mustafa and Saurabh Ray, 2010]. As a corollary, we answer an open question by Badanidiyuru, Kleinberg, and Lee [Ashwinkumar Badanidiyuru et al., 2012] regarding half-spaces in R^3 thereby settling the existence of PTASs for essentially all natural cases of geometric MC problems. As an intermediate result, we show a color-balanced version of the classical planar subdivision theorem by Frederickson [Greg N. Frederickson, 1987]. We believe that some of our ideas may be useful for analyzing local search in other settings involving a hard cardinality constraint