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We consider the number of domino tilings of an odd-by-odd rectangle that leave one hole. This problem is equivalent to the number of near-perfect matchings of the odd-by-odd rectangular grid. For any particular position of the vacancy on…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-06-05 Seok Hyun Byun , Wayne Goddard

One of the questions in Rigidity Theory is whether a realization of the vertices of a graph in the plane is flexible, namely, if it allows a continuous deformation preserving the edge lengths. A flexible realization of a connected graph in…

Computational Geometry · Computer Science 2025-12-11 Petr Laštovička , Jan Legerský

In a graph, a matching cut is an edge cut that is a matching. Matching Cut is the problem of deciding whether or not a given graph has a matching cut, which is known to be NP-complete even when restricted to bipartite graphs. It has been…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2018-10-29 Hoang-Oanh Le , Van Bang Le

Chocolate bar games are variants of the game of Nim in which the goal is to leave your opponent with the single bitter part of the chocolate bar. The rectangular chocolate bar game is a thinly disguised form of classical multi-heap Nim. In…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2017-11-15 Ryohei Miyadera , Shunsuke Nakamura , Masanori Fukui

Many efficient algorithms have been designed to recover Nash equilibria of various classes of finite games. Special classes of continuous games with infinite strategy spaces, such as polynomial games, can be solved by semidefinite…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2020-10-01 Lukáš Adam , Rostislav Horčík , Tomáš Kasl , Tomáš Kroupa

Consider the plane as a checkerboard, with each unit square colored black or white in an arbitrary manner. In a previous paper we showed that for any such coloring there are straight line segments, of arbitrarily large length, such that the…

Classical Analysis and ODEs · Mathematics 2008-11-20 Alex Iosevich , Mihail N. Kolountzakis

In this paper we study a single player game consisting of $n$ black checkers and $m$ white checkers, called shifting the checkers. We have proved that the minimum number of steps needed to play the game for general $n$ and $m$ is $nm + n +…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2013-07-18 Lei Wang , Xiaodong Wang , Yingjie Wu , Daxin Zhu

In the `Covering' pursuit game on a graph, a robber and a set of cops play alternately, with the cops each moving to an adjacent vertex (or not moving) and the robber moving to a vertex at distance at most 2 from his current vertex. The aim…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-04-22 Benjamin Gillott

The notion of graph covers (also referred to as locally bijective homomorphisms) plays an important role in topological graph theory and has found its computer science applications in models of local computation. For a fixed target graph…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2025-02-28 Jan Bok , Jiří Fiala , Nikola Jedličková , Jan Kratochvíl , Micheala Seifrtová

Chocolate-bar games are variants of the CHOMP game. A three-dimensional chocolate bar comprises a set of cubic boxes sized 1 X 1 X 1, with a bitter cubic box at the bottom of the column at position (0,0). For non-negative integers u,w such…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2022-07-20 Ryohei Miyadera , Hikaru Manabe

Li, Nikiforov and Schelp conjectured that a 2-edge coloured graph G with order n and minimal degree strictly greater than 3n/4 contains a monochromatic cycle of length l, for all l at least four and at most n/2. We prove this conjecture for…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2011-07-27 Alex Scott , Matthew White

Many popular puzzle and matching games have been analyzed through the lens of computational complexity. Prominent examples include Sudoku, Candy Crush, and Flood-It. A common theme among these widely played games is that their generalized…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2026-03-03 Linus Klocker , Simon D. Fink

We investigate the computational complexity of the following problem. We are given a graph in which each vertex has an initial and a target color. Each pair of adjacent vertices can swap their current colors. Our goal is to perform the…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2018-03-20 Katsuhisa Yamanaka , Takashi Horiyama , J. Mark Keil , David Kirkpatrick , Yota Otachi , Toshiki Saitoh , Ryuhei Uehara , Yushi Uno

We consider the cops and robber game variant consisting of one cop and one robber on time-varying graphs (TVG). The considered TVGs are edge periodic graphs, i.e., for each edge, a binary string $s_e$ determines in which time step the edge…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2021-07-13 Nils Morawietz , Petra Wolf

We introduce the idea that the P vs NP problem can have a finer structure. Given the NP complete problem of interest, the configurations space of the problem can be divided in (at least) two regions. In one region, polynomial algorithms to…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2026-01-28 Fabrizio Canfora , Marco Cedeno

Here, we present a variant of the sliding coins game. Two coins are placed on distinct squares of a semi-infinite linear board with squares numbered $0, 1, 2, dots, $. Two players take turns and move a coin to a lower unoccupied square.…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-04-29 Ryohei Miyadera , Hikaru Manabe , Unchon Lee

In the vertex colouring game on a graph $G$, Maker and Breaker alternately colour vertices of $G$ from a palette of $k$ colours, with no two adjacent vertices allowed the same colour. Maker seeks to colour the whole graph while Breaker…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2024-11-11 Lawrence Hollom

The sudoku puzzles have a long history, with variations going back more than a hundred years, but its current and perhaps surprising world-wide prominence goes back to certain initiatives and then puzzle-generating computer programmes from…

Other Statistics · Statistics 2026-04-29 Nils Lid Hjort

We introduce an impartial combinatorial game on Steiner triple systems called Nofil. Players move alternately, choosing points of the triple system. If a player is forced to fill a block on their turn, they lose. We explore the play of…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2021-03-26 Melissa A. Huggan , Svenja Huntemann , Brett Stevens

We introduce a two-player game in which one and his/her opponent attempt to pack as many ``prisoners'' as possible on the squares of an n-by-n checkerboard; each prisoner has to be ``protected'' by at least as many guards as the number of…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2008-01-08 Timothy Howard , Eugen J. Ionascu , David Woolbright