Related papers: Depth-4 Lower Bounds, Determinantal Complexity : A…
The determinantal complexity of a polynomial $P \in \mathbb{F}[x_1, \ldots, x_n]$ over a field $\mathbb{F}$ is the dimension of the smallest matrix $M$ whose entries are affine functions in $\mathbb{F}[x_1, \ldots, x_n]$ such that $P =…
In recent years, a very exciting and promising method for proving lower bounds for arithmetic circuits has been proposed. This method combines the method of {\it depth reduction} developed in the works of Agrawal-Vinay [AV08], Koiran…
Arithmetic circuits are a natural well-studied model for computing multivariate polynomials over a field. In this paper, we study planar arithmetic circuits. These are circuits whose underlying graph is planar. In particular, we prove an…
We present a top-down lower-bound method for depth-$4$ boolean circuits. In particular, we give a new proof of the well-known result that the parity function requires depth-$4$ circuits of size exponential in $n^{1/3}$. Our proof is an…
We show that any nonzero polynomial in the ideal generated by the $r \times r$ minors of an $n \times n$ matrix $X$ can be used to efficiently approximate the determinant. For any nonzero polynomial $f$ in this ideal, we construct a small…
We give the first super-polynomial separation in the power of bounded-depth boolean formulas vs. circuits. Specifically, we consider the problem Distance $k(n)$ Connectivity, which asks whether two specified nodes in a graph of size $n$ are…
Valiant's famous VP vs. VNP conjecture states that the symbolic permanent polynomial does not have polynomial-size algebraic circuits. However, the best upper bound on the size of the circuits computing the permanent is exponential.…
Proving complexity lower bounds remains a challenging task: we only know how to prove conditional uniform lower bounds and nonuniform lower bounds in restricted circuit models. Williams (STOC 2010) showed how to derive nonuniform lower…
Multiplication is one of the most fundamental computational problems, yet its true complexity remains elusive. The best known upper bound, by F\"{u}rer, shows that two $n$-bit numbers can be multiplied via a boolean circuit of size $O(n \lg…
We introduce a new algebraic proof system, which has tight connections to (algebraic) circuit complexity. In particular, we show that any super-polynomial lower bound on any Boolean tautology in our proof system implies that the permanent…
Polynomial Identity Testing (PIT) is a fundamental computational problem. The famous depth-$4$ reduction result by Agrawal and Vinay (FOCS 2008) has made PIT for depth-$4$ circuits an enticing pursuit. A restricted depth-4 circuit computing…
We show that there is a defining equation of degree at most $\mathsf{poly}(n)$ for the (Zariski closure of the) set of the non-rigid matrices: that is, we show that for every large enough field $\mathbb{F}$, there is a non-zero…
Valiant's conjecture asserts that the circuit complexity classes VP and VNP are distinct, meaning that the permanent does not admit polynomial-size algebraic circuits. As it is the case in many branches of complexity theory, the…
We show that lower bounds on the border rank of matrix multiplication can be used to non-trivially derandomize polynomial identity testing for small algebraic circuits. Letting $\underline{R}(n)$ denote the border rank of $n \times n \times…
We show that any Algebraic Branching Program (ABP) computing the polynomial $\sum_{i = 1}^n x_i^n$ has at least $\Omega(n^2)$ vertices. This improves upon the lower bound of $\Omega(n\log n)$, which follows from the classical result of Baur…
In this note, we give a short, simple and almost completely self contained proof of a classical result of Kaltofen [Kal86, Kal87, Kal89] which shows that if an $n$ variate degree $d$ polynomial $f$ can be computed by an arithmetic circuit…
Both the combinatorial and the circuit diameters of polyhedra are of interest to the theory of linear programming for their intimate connection to a best-case performance of linear programming algorithms. We study the diameters of dual…
We study the size blow-up that is necessary to convert an algebraic circuit of product-depth $\Delta+1$ to one of product-depth $\Delta$ in the multilinear setting. We show that for every positive $\Delta = \Delta(n) = o(\log n/\log \log…
We establish a generic form of hardness amplification for the approximability of constant-depth Boolean circuits by polynomials. Specifically, we show that if a Boolean circuit cannot be pointwise approximated by low-degree polynomials to…
We study limitations of polynomials computed by depth two circuits built over read-once polynomials (ROPs) and depth three syntactically multi-linear formulas. We prove an exponential lower bound for the size of the $\Sigma\Pi^{[N^{1/30}]}$…