Statistical Mechanics of an NP-complete Problem: Subset Sum
Statistical Mechanics
2007-05-23 v2 Disordered Systems and Neural Networks
Abstract
We study statistical properties of an NP-complete problem, the subset sum, using the methods and concepts of statistical mechanics. The problem is a generalization of the number partitioning problem, which is also an NP-complete problem and has been studied in the physics literature. The asymptotic expressions for the number of solutions are obtained. These results applied to the number partitioning problem as a special case are compared with those which were previously obtained by a different method. We discuss the limit of applicability of the techniques of statistical mechanics to the present problem.
Cite
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0106125,
title = {Statistical Mechanics of an NP-complete Problem: Subset Sum},
author = {T. Sasamoto and T. Toyoizumi and H. Nishimori},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0106125},
year = {2007}
}
Comments
17 pages, 2 figures