Related papers: Minimal and maximal Numbrix puzzles

Solving a Radon-Kaczmarz puzzle involves filling a square grid with positive integers, each between one and nine, satisfying certain clues coming from the sum of entries that lie on the same line in the square grid. Given a set of slopes…

We show a general problem-solving tool called limit theory. This is an advanced version of asymptotic analysis of discrete problems when some finite parameter tends to infinity. We will apply it on three closely related problems. Alpern's…

In a typical regular expression (regex) crossword puzzle, you are given two nonempty lists $R_1,\ldots,R_m$ and $C_1,\ldots,C_n$ of regular expressions over some alphabet, and your goal is to fill in an $m\times n$ grid with letters from…

We give a variety of magic hexagons of Orders from 3 to 7, many of which are extensions of known results. We also give a theorem that their are an infinite number of magic hexagons of Order $n$ for any fixed positive integer $n$ for any…

For the set of graphs with a given degree sequence, consisting of any number of $2's$ and $1's$, and its subset of bipartite graphs, we characterize the optimal graphs who maximize and minimize the number of $m$-matchings. We find the…

We consider the allocation of $m$ balls into $n$ bins with incomplete information. In the classical Two-Choice process a ball first queries the load of two randomly chosen bins and is then placed in the least loaded bin. In our setting,…

Over some types of trees with a given number of vertices, which trees minimize or maximize the total number of subtrees or leaf containing subtrees are studied. Here are some of the main results:\ (1)\, Sharp upper bound on the total number…

The number of embeddings of minimally rigid graphs in $\mathbb{R}^D$ is (by definition) finite, modulo rigid transformations, for every generic choice of edge lengths. Even though various approaches have been proposed to compute it, the gap…

We establish an explicit upper bound for the Euclidean minimum of a number field which depends, in a precise manner, only on its discriminant and the number of real and complex embeddings. Such bounds were shown to exist by Davenport and…

We study the repeated balls-into-bins process introduced by Becchetti, Clementi, Natale, Pasquale and Posta (2019). This process starts with $m$ balls arbitrarily distributed across $n$ bins. At each round $t=1,2,\ldots$, one ball is…

A graph is called (generically) rigid in R^d if, for any choice of sufficiently generic edge lengths, it can be embedded in R^d in a finite number of distinct ways, modulo rigid transformations. Here, we deal with the problem of determining…

We give bounds on the number of non-simple closed curves on a negatively curved surface, given upper bounds on both length and self-intersection number. In particular, it was previously known that the number of all closed curves of length…

The solving degree is an important parameter for estimating the complexity of solving a system of polynomial equations. In this paper, we provide an upper bound for the solving degree in terms of the degree of regularity. We also show that…

A matching $M$ in a graph $G$ is uniquely restricted if no other matching in $G$ covers the same set of vertices. We prove that any connected subcubic graph with $n$ vertices and girth at least $5$ contains a uniquely restricted matching of…

For a $d$-dimensional polytope with $v$ vertices, $d+1\le v\le2d$, we calculate precisely the minimum possible number of $m$-dimensional faces, when $m=1$ or $m\ge0.62d$. This confirms a conjecture of Gr\"unbaum, for these values of $m$.…

A fundamental problem in computer science is to find all the common zeroes of $m$ quadratic polynomials in $n$ unknowns over $\mathbb{F}_2$. The cryptanalysis of several modern ciphers reduces to this problem. Up to now, the best complexity…

In this paper we demonstrate a method for counting the number of solutions to various logic puzzles. Specifically, we remove all of the "clues" from the puzzle which help the solver to a unique solution, and instead start from an empty…

Given an integer n greater of equal to 3, we investigate the minimal dimension of a subalgebra of M_n(K) with a trivial centralizer. It is shown that this dimension is 5 when n is even and 4 when it is odd. In the latter case, we also…

We establish a lower bound on the forcing numbers of domino tilings computable in polynomial time based on height functions. This lower bound is sharp for a 2n by 2n square as well as other cases.

The Rubik's Cube is perhaps the world's most famous and iconic puzzle, well-known to have a rich underlying mathematical structure (group theory). In this paper, we show that the Rubik's Cube also has a rich underlying algorithmic…