English

Solving Hypergraph Laplacian Systems in Almost-Linear Time

Data Structures and Algorithms 2026-05-01 v1

Abstract

For a connected weighted hypergraph, we give a randomized almost-linear-time solver for the Poisson problem for the cut-based hypergraph Laplacian in the natural input size P=eEeP=\sum_{e\in E}|e|, the sum of hyperedge sizes. For every fixed constant C>0C>0, our randomized algorithm runs in P1+o(1)P^{1+o(1)} time and, with high probability over its internal randomness, returns a primal point and a dual certificate, with additive optimality gap at most exp(logCP)\exp(-\log^C P). A key step is to rewrite the Fenchel dual as a convex-flow problem on an auxiliary O(P)O(P)-arc graph, yielding a near-optimal dual flow. The main difficulty is primal recovery, because this flow does not by itself determine a primal potential. Our main new ingredient is a recovery theorem showing that, for primal recovery, the detailed routing of the dual flow inside each hyperedge gadget can be discarded: one nonnegative scalar per hyperedge is enough. After the necessary finite-precision rounding, these scalars define a linear-cost min-cost-flow instance on the auxiliary graph, and solving it exactly recovers a primal potential. Finally, a ground-vertex reduction from regularized objectives to the Poisson solver gives randomized almost-linear-time resolvent/proximal primitives for the same cut-based hypergraph Laplacian.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2604.27651,
  title  = {Solving Hypergraph Laplacian Systems in Almost-Linear Time},
  author = {Yuichi Yoshida},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2604.27651},
  year   = {2026}
}
R2 v1 2026-07-01T12:43:16.117Z