Related papers: Preservation and decomposition theorems for bounde…
We consider the length of the longest word definable in FO and MSO via a formula of size n. For both logics we obtain as an upper bound for this number an exponential tower of height linear in n. We prove this by counting types with respect…
For every $q\in \mathbb N$ let $\textrm{FO}_q$ denote the class of sentences of first-order logic FO of quantifier rank at most $q$. If a graph property can be defined in $\textrm{FO}_q$, then it can be decided in time $O(n^q)$. Thus,…
We prove that, on bounded expansion classes, every first-order formula with modulo counting is equivalent, in a linear-time computable monadic expansion, to an existential first-order formula. As a consequence, we derive, on bounded…
A canonical result in model theory is the homomorphism preservation theorem (h.p.t.) which states that a first-order formula is preserved under homomorphisms iff it is equivalent to an existential-positive formula, standardly proved via a…
Lifting attempts to speed up probabilistic inference by exploiting symmetries in the model. Exact lifted inference methods, like their propositional counterparts, work by recursively decomposing the model and the problem. In the…
A central computational task in database theory, finite model theory, and computer science at large is the evaluation of a first-order sentence on a finite structure. In the context of this task, the \emph{width} of a sentence, defined as…
Constraint propagation is one of the basic forms of inference in many logic-based reasoning systems. In this paper, we investigate constraint propagation for first-order logic (FO), a suitable language to express a wide variety of…
This paper establishes model-theoretic properties of $\mathrm{FOE}^{\infty}$, a variation of monadic first-order logic that features the generalised quantifier $\exists^\infty$ (`there are infinitely many'). We provide syntactically defined…
Enumerating the result set of a first-order query over a relational structure of bounded degree can be done with linear preprocessing and constant delay. In this work, we extend this result towards the compressed perspective where the…
We analyze the behaviour of declarations of independence between existential quantifiers in quantifier prefixes of IF sentences; we give a syntactical criterion for deciding whether a sentence beginning with such prefix exists such that its…
We prove that the model checking problem for the existential fragment of first-order (FO) logic on partially ordered sets is fixed-parameter tractable (FPT) with respect to the formula and the width of a poset (the maximum size of an…
We study the expressive power and succinctness of order-invariant sentences of first-order (FO) and monadic second-order (MSO) logic on structures of bounded tree-depth. Order- invariance is undecidable in general and, thus, one strives for…
The solution of many physical evolution equations can be expressed as an exponential of two or more operators acting on initial data. Accurate solutions can be systematically derived by decomposing the exponential in a product form. For…
It was recently shown by van den Broeck at al. that the symmetric weighted first-order model counting problem (WFOMC) for sentences of two-variable logic FO2 is in polynomial time, while it is Sharp-P_1 complete for some FO3-sentences. We…
Over the past two decades several fragments of first-order logic have been identified and shown to have good computational and algorithmic properties, to a great extent as a result of appropriately describing the image of the standard…
We study the problem of checking whether an existential sentence (that is, a first-order sentence in prefix form built using existential quantifiers and all Boolean connectives) is true in a finite partially ordered set (in short, a poset).…
The class of problems complete for NP via first-order reductions is known to be characterized by existential second-order sentences of a fixed form. All such sentences are built around the so-called generalized IS-form of the sentence that…
We introduce the logic FOCN(P) which extends first-order logic by counting and by numerical predicates from a set P, and which can be viewed as a natural generalisation of various counting logics that have been studied in the literature. We…
We revisit the work studying homomorphism preservation for first-order logic in sparse classes of structures initiated in [Atserias et al., JACM 2006] and [Dawar, JCSS 2010]. These established that first-order logic has the homomorphism…
We show that the existence of a first-order formula separating two monadic second order formulas over countable ordinal words is decidable. This extends the work of Henckell and Almeida on finite words, and of Place and Zeitoun on…