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We consider a pursuit-evasion game that describes the process of extinguishing a fire burning on the nodes of an undirected graph. We denote the minimum number of firefighters required by ffn(G) and provide almost sharp bounds to this graph…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2026-04-15 Julius Althoetmar , Jamico Schade , Torben Schürenberg

In this paper, we consider the following \emph{$k$-many firefighter problem} on a finite graph $G=(V,E)$. Suppose that a fire breaks out at a given vertex $v \in V$. In each subsequent time unit, a firefighter protects $k$ vertices which…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2014-06-12 Paweł Prałat

It is known that the online firefighting is 2-competitive on trees (Coupechoux et al. 2019), which suggests that the problem is relatively easy on trees. We extend the study to graphs containing cycles. We first show that the presence of…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2026-02-09 Max Hugen , Bob Krekelberg , Alison Hsiang-Hsuan Liu

Suppose we have a network that is represented by a graph $G$. Potentially a fire (or other type of contagion) might erupt at some vertex of $G$. We are able to respond to this outbreak by establishing a firebreak at $k$ other vertices of…

Temporal graphs are graphs whose edges are labelled with times at which they are active. Their time-sensitivity provides a useful model of real networks, but renders many problems studied on temporal graphs more computationally complex than…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2026-04-28 Jessica Enright , Samuel D. Hand , Laura Larios-Jones , Kitty Meeks

The severity of wildfires can be mitigated adopting preventive measures like the construction of firebreaks that are strips of land from which the vegetation is completely removed. In this paper, we model the problem of wildfire containment…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2022-04-13 Marc Demange , Alessia Di Fonso , Gabriele Di Stefano , Pierpaolo Vittorini

In the Firefighter problem, a fire breaks out at a vertex of a graph and at each subsequent time step, the firefighter chooses a vertex to protect and then the fire spreads from each burned vertex to every unprotected neighbour. The problem…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2021-08-03 Margaret-Ellen Messinger , Spencer Yarnell

Covering all edges of a graph by a small number of vertices, this is the NP-complete Vertex Cover problem. It is among the most fundamental graph-algorithmic problems. Following a recent trend in studying temporal graphs (a sequence of…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2020-07-02 Till Fluschnik , Rolf Niedermeier , Valentin Rohm , Philipp Zschoche

The spread of an infection, a contagion, meme, emotion, message and various other spreadable objects have been discussed in several works. Burning and firefighting have been discussed in particular on static graphs. Graph burning simulates…

Physics and Society · Physics 2023-11-17 Arya Tanmay Gupta

In the last decade, wildfires have become wider and more destructive. The climate change and the growth of urban areas may further increase the probability of incidence of large-scale fires. The risk of fire can be lowered with preventive…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2021-03-19 Marc Demange , Alessia Di Fonso , Gabriele Di Stefano , Pierpaolo Vittorini

A temporal graph is a finite sequence of graphs, called snapshots, over the same vertex set. Many temporal graph problems turn out to be much more difficult than their static counterparts. One such problem is \textsc{Timeline Vertex Cover}…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2025-10-10 Anton Herrmann , Christian Komusiewicz , Nils Morawietz , Frank Sommer

The Minimum Vertex Cover problem, a classical NP-complete problem, presents significant challenges for exact solution on large graphs. Fixed-Parameter Tractability (FPT) offers a powerful paradigm to address such problems by exploiting a…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2025-07-15 Mumuksh Tayal

Graph colouring is a fundamental problem for networks, serving as a tool for avoiding conflicts via symmetry breaking, for example, avoiding multiple computer processes simultaneously updating the same resource. This paper considers a…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2025-11-26 Duncan Adamson , George B. Mertzios , Paul G. Spirakis

Recently, Bumpus and Meeks introduced a purely temporal parameter, called vertex-interval-membership-width, which is promising for the design of fixed-parameter tractable (FPT) algorithms for vertex reachability problems in temporal graphs.…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2025-07-09 Justine Cauvi , Laurent Viennot

We study how we can accelerate the spreading of information in temporal graphs via shifting operations; a problem that captures real-world applications varying from information flows to distribution schedules. In a temporal graph there is a…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2025-10-09 Argyrios Deligkas , Eduard Eiben , George Skretas

In this work, we follow the current trend on temporal graph realization, where one is given a property P and the goal is to determine whether there is a temporal graph, that is, a graph where the edge set changes over time, with property P…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2025-10-03 Justine Cauvi , Nils Morawietz , Laurent Viennot

A procedure called \textit{graph burning} was introduced to facilitate the modelling of spread of an alarm, a social contagion, or a social influence or emotion on graphs and networks. Graph burning runs on discrete time-steps (or rounds).…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2020-10-06 Arya Tanmay Gupta

Temporal graphs are introduced to model systems where the relationships among the entities of the system evolve over time. In this paper, we consider the temporal graphs where the edge set changes with time and all the changes are known a…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2025-08-15 Rinku Kumar , Bodhisatwa Mazumdar , Subhrangsu Mandal

Temporal graphs provide a useful model for many real-world networks. Unfortunately the majority of algorithmic problems we might consider on such graphs are intractable. There has been recent progress in defining structural parameters which…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2024-11-20 Jessica Enright , Samuel D. Hand , Laura Larios-Jones , Kitty Meeks

In this paper we initiate the study of the temporal graph realization problem with respect to the fastest path durations among its vertices, while we focus on periodic temporal graphs. Given an $n \times n$ matrix $D$ and a $\Delta \in…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2024-05-02 Nina Klobas , George B. Mertzios , Hendrik Molter , Paul G. Spirakis