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A strength of parameterized algorithmics is that each problem can be parameterized by an essentially inexhaustible set of parameters. Usually, the choice of the considered parameter is informed by the theoretical relations between…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2026-05-05 Christian Komusiewicz , Nils Morawietz , Frank Sommer , Luca Pascal Staus

We study the parameterized complexity of interdiction problems in graphs. For an optimization problem on graphs, one can formulate an interdiction problem as a game consisting of two players, namely, an interdictor and an evader, who…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2014-01-14 Jiong Guo , Yash Raj Shrestha

A \emph{periodic graph} ${\cal G}=(G_0, G_1, G_2, \dots)$ with period $p$ is an infinite periodic sequence of graphs $G_i = G_{i + p} = (V,E_i)$, where $i \geq 0$. The graph $G=(V,\cup_i E_i)$ is called the footprint of ${\cal G}$.…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2024-10-30 Jean-Lou De Carufel , Paola Flocchini , Nicola Santoro , Frédéric Simard

We examine a version of the Cops and Robber (CR) game in which the robber is invisible, i.e., the cops do not know his location until they capture him. Apparently this game (CiR) has received little attention in the CR literature. We…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2015-03-19 Athanasios Kehagias , Dieter Mitsche , Pawel Pralat

The Vertex Cover problem plays an essential role in the study of polynomial kernelization in parameterized complexity, i.e., the study of provable and efficient preprocessing for NP-hard problems. Motivated by the great variety of positive…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2019-05-10 Eva-Maria C. Hols , Stefan Kratsch , Astrid Pieterse

The game of cops and robber has been studied for many years. Denoting $\mathsf{Forb}(4K_1)$ to be the family of all graphs that contain no induced subgraph isomorphic to $4K_1$ (e.g., with independence number less than $4$), we prove that…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2026-01-15 Zhaoyu Wu

In previous work, we introduced median decompositions, a generalisation of tree decompositions where a graph can be modelled after any median graph, along with a hierarchy of $i$-medianwidth parameters $(mw_i)_{i\geq 1}$ starting from…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2016-03-23 Konstantinos Stavropoulos

We propose a definition of generalized Cops and Robbers games where there are two players, the Pursuer and the Evader, who each move via prescribed rules. If the Pursuer can ensure that the game enters into a fixed set of final positions,…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2017-04-20 Anthony Bonato , Gary MacGillivray

Many problems are NP-hard and, unless P = NP, do not admit polynomial-time exact algorithms. The fastest known exact algorithms exactly usually take time exponential in the input size. Much research effort has gone into obtaining faster…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2025-01-27 Stefan Kratsch , Pascal Kunz

Can we use machine learning to compress graph data? The absence of ordering in graphs poses a significant challenge to conventional compression algorithms, limiting their attainable gains as well as their ability to discover relevant…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-09-26 Giorgos Bouritsas , Andreas Loukas , Nikolaos Karalias , Michael M. Bronstein

We prove that any graph excluding $K_r$ as a minor has can be partitioned into clusters of diameter at most $\Delta$ while removing at most $O(r/\Delta)$ fraction of the edges. This improves over the results of Fakcharoenphol and Talwar,…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2021-01-12 Ittai Abraham , Cyril Gavoille , Anupam Gupta , Ofer Neiman , Kunal Talwar

In Two-Sets Cut-Uncut, we are given an undirected graph $G=(V,E)$ and two terminal sets $S$ and $T$. The task is to find a minimum cut $C$ in $G$ (if there is any) separating $S$ from $T$ under the following ``uncut'' condition. In the…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2024-08-27 Matthias Bentert , Fedor V. Fomin , Fanny Hauser , Saket Saurabh

We study the parameterized complexity of a broad class of problems called "local graph partitioning problems" that includes the classical fixed cardinality problems as max k-vertex cover, k-densest subgraph, etc. By developing a technique…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2013-06-11 Edouard Bonnet , Bruno Escoffier , Vangelis Th. Paschos , Emeric Tourniaire

Capacitated Vertex Cover is the hard-capacitated variant of Vertex Cover: given a graph, a capacity for every vertex, and an integer $k$, the task is to select at most $k$ vertices that cover all edges and assign each edge to one of its…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2026-04-22 Michael Lampis , Manolis Vasilakis

We consider the problem of firefighting to save a critical subset of nodes. The firefighting game is a turn-based game played on a graph, where the fire spreads to vertices in a breadth-first manner from a source, and firefighters can be…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2017-06-01 Jayesh Choudhari , Anirban Dasgupta , Neeldhara Misra , M. S. Ramanujan

We consider the Cops and Robbers game played on finite simple graphs. In a graph $G$, the number of cops required to capture a robber in the Cops and Robbers game is denoted by $c(G)$. For all graphs $G$, $c(G) \leq \alpha(G) \leq…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-07-22 Alexander Clow , Imed Zaguia

In the game of Cops and Robbers, the capture time of a graph is the minimum number of moves needed by the cops to capture the robber, assuming optimal play. We prove that the capture time of the $n$-dimensional hypercube is $\Theta (n\ln…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2013-08-16 Anthony Bonato , William B. Kinnersley , P. Gordinowicz , P. Pralat

As graphs continue to grow in size, we seek ways to effectively process such data at scale. The model of streaming graph processing, in which a compact summary is maintained as each edge insertion/deletion is observed, is an attractive one.…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2014-07-25 Rajesh Chitnis , Graham Cormode , MohammadTaghi Hajiaghayi , Morteza Monemizadeh

In this paper we study the complexity of the following problems: Given a colored graph X=(V,E,c), compute a minimum cardinality set S of vertices such that no nontrivial automorphism of X fixes all vertices in S. A closely related problem…

Computational Complexity · Computer Science 2016-06-15 V. Arvind , Frank Fuhlbrück , Johannes Köbler , Sebastian Kuhnert , Gaurav Rattan

We consider several variants of the classical Cops and Robbers game. We treat the version where the robber can move R > 1 edges at a time, establishing a general upper bound of N / \alpha ^{(1-o(1))\sqrt{log_\alpha N}}, where \alpha = 1 +…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2010-04-15 Alan Frieze , Michael Krivelevich , Po-Shen Loh