209133
Computing planar intertwines
The proof of Wagner's conjecture by N. Robertson and P. Seymour gives a finite description of any family of graphs which is closed under the minor ordering, called the obstructions of the family. Since the intersection and the union of two minor closed graph families are again a minor closed graph family, an interesting question is that of computing the obstructions of the new family given the obstructions for the original two families. It is easy to compute the obstructions of the intersection, but, until very recently, it was an open problem to compute the obstructions of the union. It is shown that if the original families are planar, then the obstructions of the union are no larger than n to the O(n/sup 2/) power, where n is the size of the largest obstruction of the original family.<<ETX>>
28349058
A Constructive Proof that Trees Are Well-Quasi-Ordered Under Minors
The recent proof of Robertson and Seymour that graphs are well-quasi-ordered under minors immediately implies that a number of intesting problems have polynomial time algorithms. However, partially because of their non-constructive nature, these proofs do not yield any information about the algorithms. Here we present a constructive proof that trees are well-quasi-ordered under minors. This extends the results of Murty and Russell [MR90] who give a constructive proof of Higman's Lemma. Our proof is based on transforming finite sequences of trees to ordinals. We begin by describing a transformation which carries trees to finite strings of numbers and give an ordering on these strings which preserves the minor ordering on the underlying trees. We show that in our well-quasi-ordering argument, these strings are actually over a finite alphabet. This allows us to conclude the result. We require the well-ordering of the ordinal e0 for our proof.
204999323
Acyclic Directed Hypercubes may have Exponential Diameter
Abstract The diameter of a directed graph is the maximum of the lengths of the shortest paths between all pairs of vertices (if such paths exist). We prove that for every n , the edges of the n -dimensional hypercube can be acyclically oriented such that the diameter of the cube is F n + 1 , the ( n + 1)st Fibonacci number.
42435460
Embeddings of k-connected graphs of pathwidth k
We present O(n^3) embedding algorithms (subgraph isomorphism and its generalizations) for classes of graphs of bounded pathwidth, where n is the number of vertices in the graph. These include the first polynomial-time algorithm for minor containment and the first O(n^c) algorithm (c a constant independent of k) for topological embedding of graphs from subclasses of partial k-trees, as well as an O(n^2) algorithm for subgraph isomorphism. Of independent interest are structural properties of k-connected graphs of bounded pathwidth on which our algorithms are based. We also describe special cases which reduce to various generalizations of string matching, permitting more efficient solutions. Finally, we describe n^k^+^O^(^1^) algorithms for solving these problems on arbitrary graphs of pathwidth at most k.
2367227
Parallel Algorithms For Vehicle Routing Problems
Vehicle routing problems involve the navigation of one or more vehicles through a network of locations. Locations have associated handling times as well as time windows during which they are active. The arcs connecting locations have time costs associated with them. In this paper, we consider two different problems in single vehicle routing. The first is to find least time cost routes between all pairs of nodes in a network for navigating vehicles; we call this the all pairs routing problem. We show that there is an O(log3 n) time parallel algorithm using a polynomial number of processors for this problem on a CREW PRAM. We next consider the problem in which a vehicle services all locations in a network. Here, locations can be passed through at any time but only serviced during their time window. The general problem is -complete under even fairly stringent restrictions but polynomial algorithms have been developed for some special cases. In particular, when the network is a line, there is no time cost in servicing a location, and all time windows are unbounded at either their lower or upper end, O(n2) algorithms have been developed. We show that under the same conditions, we can reduce this problem to the all pairs routing problem and therefore obtain an O(log3 n) time parallel algorithm on a CREW PRAM.
38885821
Embeddings of k-Connected Graphs of Pathwidth k
We present O(n3) embedding algorithms (generalizing subgraph isomorphism) for classes of graphs of bounded pathwidth, where n is the number of vertices in the graph. These include the first polynomialtime algorithm for minor containment and the first O(nc) algorithm (c a constant independent of k) for topological embedding of graphs from subclasses of partial k-trees. Of independent interest are structural properties of k-connected graphs of bounded pathwidth on which our algorithms are based. We also describe special cases which reduce to various generalizations of string matching, permitting more efficient solutions.
1412337
Simpler and better approximation algorithms for network design
We give simple and easy-to-analyze randomized approximation algorithms for several well-studied NP-hard network design problems. Our algorithms improve over the previously best known approximation ratios. Our main results are the following.We give a randomized 3.55-approximation algorithm for the connected facility location problem. The algorithm requires three lines to state, one page to analyze, and improves the best-known performance guarantee for the problem.We give a 5.55-approximation algorithm for virtual private network design. Previously, constant-factor approximation algorithms were known only for special cases of this problem.We give a simple constant-factor approximation algorithm for the single-sink buy-at-bulk network design problem. Our performance guarantee improves over what was previously known, and is an order of magnitude improvement over previous combinatorial approximation algorithms for the problem.
96295
Efficient algorithms for pattern matching on directed acyclic graphs
Recently graph data models have become increasingly popular in many scientific fields. Efficient query processing over such data is critical. Existing works often rely on index structures that store pre-computed transitive relations to achieve efficient graph matching. In this paper, we present a family of stack-based algorithms to handle path and twig pattern queries for directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) in particular. With the worst-case space cost linearly bounded by the number of edges in the graph, our algorithms achieve a quadratic runtime complexity in the average size of the query variable bindings. This is optimal among the navigation-based graph matching algorithms.
2827898
Content-Based Image Retrieval at the End of the Early Years
Presents a review of 200 references in content-based image retrieval. The paper starts with discussing the working conditions of content-based retrieval: patterns of use, types of pictures, the role of semantics, and the sensory gap. Subsequent sections discuss computational steps for image retrieval systems. Step one of the review is image processing for retrieval sorted by color, texture, and local geometry. Features for retrieval are discussed next, sorted by: accumulative and global features, salient points, object and shape features, signs, and structural combinations thereof. Similarity of pictures and objects in pictures is reviewed for each of the feature types, in close connection to the types and means of feedback the user of the systems is capable of giving by interaction. We briefly discuss aspects of system engineering: databases, system architecture, and evaluation. In the concluding section, we present our view on: the driving force of the field, the heritage from computer vision, the influence on computer vision, the role of similarity and of interaction, the need for databases, the problem of evaluation, and the role of the semantic gap.
100323
Tree based MPLS routing
MPLS (MultiProtocol Label Switching) is a new technology proposed by the IETF [4,10] for network routing, and is being increasingly deployed by the largest Internet service providers. The MPLS technology differs from conventional network protocols in a crucial way: instead of reading the entire packet header at all switching points, the analysis of the packet header is done just once, when the packet header is assigned a stack of labels, and thenceforth, each switching point or router just gets to look at the label at the top of the stack (and the ingress edge), and based only on this information, it has to make a decision about the next-hop node [17,16]. In another departure from conventional routing and in particular from IP source routing, where the entire packet route is explicitly put in the header and popped off along the route, the router can not only pop the top label, it can push other labels on top of the stack.The two parameters of interest in designing MPLS routing protocols are the number of labels used, and the depth of the stack used for routing. Clearly, both cannot be simultaneously minimized, and there is often an interesting trade-off between label size and stack depth: it is obvious that if k labels are used, one must have a stack depth of logk n.In fact, it was not known whether this bound could be achieved even for trees; the best stack depth previously achieved with a constant number of labels was O(log2 n). In this paper, we show that one can indeed get asymptotically optimal upper bounds and route on trees using k labels and a maximum stack depth of O(logk n), and that this trade-off can be achieved using a simpler and more intuitive protocol than the one given in [9]. These tree-routing ideas are then shown to give better routing protocols for planar graphs as well. In particular, we show how to route along near-shortest paths (of length at most (1 + ε) times the shortest-path) with O(log2 n/ε) labels and logarithmic stack depth. We also apply them to graphs with smaller separators, including most large ISP networks.
35215015
Coarse Grain Preconditioned Conjugate Gradient Solver for Large Sparse Systems
We explore a coarse grain parallel algorithm for the solution of large sparse linear systems with symmetric positive definite matrix, based on a preconditioned conjugate gradient method.