Bilu-Linial stability, certified algorithms and the Independent Set problem

We study the Maximum Independent Set (MIS) problem under the notion of stability introduced by Bilu and Linial (2010): a weighted instance of MIS is $\gamma$-stable if it has a unique optimal solution that remains the unique optimum under multiplicative perturbations of the weights by a factor of at most $\gamma\geq 1$. The goal then is to efficiently recover the unique optimal solution. In this work, we solve stable instances of MIS on several graphs classes: we solve $\widetilde{O}(\Delta/\sqrt{\log \Delta})$-stable instances on graphs of maximum degree $\Delta$, $(k - 1)$-stable instances on $k$-colorable graphs and $(1 + \varepsilon)$-stable instances on planar graphs. For general graphs, we present a strong lower bound showing that there are no efficient algorithms for $O(n^{\frac{1}{2} - \varepsilon})$-stable instances of MIS, assuming the planted clique conjecture. We also give an algorithm for $(\varepsilon n)$-stable instances. As a by-product of our techniques, we give algorithms and lower bounds for stable instances of Node Multiway Cut. Furthermore, we prove a general result showing that the integrality gap of convex relaxations of several maximization problems reduces dramatically on stable instances. Moreover, we initiate the study of certified algorithms, a notion recently introduced by Makarychev and Makarychev (2018), which is a class of $\gamma$-approximation algorithms that satisfy one crucial property: the solution returned is optimal for a perturbation of the original instance. We obtain $\Delta$-certified algorithms for MIS on graphs of maximum degree $\Delta$, and $(1+\varepsilon)$-certified algorithms on planar graphs. Finally, we analyze the algorithm of Berman and Furer (1994) and prove that it is a $\left(\frac{\Delta + 1}{3} + \varepsilon\right)$-certified algorithm for MIS on graphs of maximum degree $\Delta$ where all weights are equal to 1.