Odd neighborhood transversals on grid graphs

An odd neighborhood transversal of a graph is a set of its vertices that intersects the set of neighbors of each of its vertices in an odd number of elements. In the case of grid graphs this odd number will be either one or three. We characterize those grid graphs that have odd neighborhood transversals.     

Deterministic random walks on finite graphs

The rotor‐router model, also known as the Propp machine, is a deterministic process analogous to a random walk on a graph. Instead of distributing tokens to randomly chosen neighbors, the Propp machine deterministically serves the neighbors in a fixed order by associating to each vertex a “rotor‐router” pointing to one of its neighbors. This paper investigates the discrepancy at a single vertex between the number of tokens in the rotor‐router model and the expected number of tokens in a random walk, for finite graphs in general. We show that the discrepancy is bounded by O (mn) at any time for any initial configuration if the corresponding random walk is lazy and reversible, where n and m denote the numbers of nodes and edges, respectively. For a lower bound, we show examples of graphs and initial configurations for which the discrepancy at a single vertex is Ω(m) at any time (> 0). For some special graphs, namely hypercube skeletons and Johnson graphs, we give a polylogarithmic upper bound, in terms of the number of nodes, for the discrepancy. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 46,739–761, 2015     

Weakly interacting particle systems on inhomogeneous random graphs

We consider weakly interacting diffusions on time varying random graphs. The system consists of a large number of nodes in which the state of each node is governed by a diffusion process that is influenced by the neighboring nodes. The collection of neighbors of a given node changes dynamically over time and is determined through a time evolving random graph process. A law of large numbers and a propagation of chaos result is established for a multi-type population setting where at each instant the interaction between nodes is given by an inhomogeneous random graph which may change over time. This result covers the setting in which the edge probabilities between any two nodes are allowed to decay to 0 as the size of the system grows. A central limit theorem is established for the single-type population case under stronger conditions on the edge probability function.     

Multi-exchange neighborhood structures for the capacitated minimum spanning tree problem

The capacitated minimum spanning tree (CMST) problem is to find a minimum cost spanning tree with an additional cardinality constraint on the sizes of the subtrees incident to a given root node. The CMST problem is an NP-complete problem, and existing exact algorithms can solve only small size problems. Currently, the best available heuristic procedures for the CMST problem are tabu search algorithms due to Amberg et al. and Sharaiha et al. These algorithms use two-exchange neighborhood structures that are based on exchanging a single node or a set of nodes between two subtrees. In this paper, we generalize their neighborhood structures to allow exchanges of nodes among multiple subtrees simultaneously; we refer to such neighborhood structures as multi-exchange neighborhood structures. Our first multi-exchange neighborhood structure allows exchanges of single nodes among several subtrees. Our second multi-exchange neighborhood structure allows exchanges that involve multiple subtrees. The size of each of these neighborhood structures grows exponentially with the problem size without any substantial increase in the computational times needed to find improved neighbors. Our approach, which is based on the cyclic transfer neighborhood structure due to Thompson and Psaraftis and Thompson and Orlin transforms a profitable exchange into a negative cost subset-disjoint cycle in a graph, called an improvement graph, and identifies these cycles using variants of shortest path label-correcting algorithms. Our computational results with GRASP and tabu search algorithms based on these neighborhood structures reveal that (i) for the unit demand case our algorithms obtained the best available solutions for all benchmark instances and improved some; and (ii) for the heterogeneous demand case our algorithms improved the best available solutions for most of the benchmark instances with improvements by as much as 18%. The running times our multi-exchange neighborhood search algorithms are comparable to those taken by two-exchange neighborhood search algorithms. Received: September 1998 / Accepted: March 2001?Published online May 18, 2001     

Chip-Firing Games on Directed Graphs

We consider the following (solitary) game: each node of a directed graph contains a pile of chips. A move consists of selecting a node with at least as many chips as its outdegree, and sending one chip along each outgoing edge to its neighbors. We extend to directed graphs several results on the undirected version obtained earlier by the authors, P. Shor, and G. Tardos, and we discuss some new topics such as periodicity, reachability, and probabilistic aspects.Among the new results specifically concerning digraphs, we relate the length of the shortest period of an infinite game to the length of the longest terminating game, and also to the access time of random walks on the same graph. These questions involve a study of the Laplace operator for directed graphs. We show that for many graphs, in particular for undirected graphs, the problem whether a given position of the chips can be reached from the initial position is polynomial time solvable.Finally, we show how the basic properties of the probabilistic abacus can be derived from our results.     

The Co‐evolution of cooperation and complexity in a multi‐player,local‐interaction prisoners' dilemma

Agents located on a 20 × 20 toroidal lattice play a Prisoners' Dilemma game with their Moore neighbors, adopting policies of cooperation and defection that depend only on their own action and the number of cooperators in the neighborhood in the last round of the game. These policies (“characters”) are encoded in 19‐bit strings, which are subjected to evolution according to a genetic algorithm, with selection based on the cumulative scores of the agents in the neighborhood over 10 rounds of the basic game. Simulations examine the evolution of the population of characters over 1000 generations. Even with selection disabled, the genetic algorithm organizes the population into a small number of surviving characters clustered in spatially homogeneous regions. Selection for fitness rapidly achieves uniform cooperation. The characters evolved cooperate on the initial play, continue to cooperate when five or more of their neighbors cooperate, tend to defect defensively when they have cooperated and most of their neighbors have defected, and switch back to cooperation when five or more neighbors cooperate. When selection operates at the level of the whole society, however, the diversity of the population rapidly collapses, a single character predominates, and the cooperativeness of the dominating character is a matter of chance, so that there is no systematic tendency to evolve cooperation. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Splitting graphs when calculating Myerson value for pure overhead games

A communication situation consists of a coalitional game and a graph, the nodes of the graph corresponding to the players of the game. To calculate the Myerson value for such situations, we obtain results which extend those well known for trees and cycle-complete graphs. On the other hand, in order to reduce the associated calculus for communication situations with a pure overhead game, the possibility of splitting the graph in several subgraphs is analyzed. For each fixed decomposition of the graph, a subspace of games compatible with this decomposition is given.     

Approximation Schemes for the Generalized Traveling Salesman Problem

A graph Γ is called a Deza graph if it is regular and the number of common neighbors of any two distinct vertices is one of two fixed values. A Deza graph is called a strictly Deza graph if it has diameter 2 and is not strongly regular. In 1992, Gardiner et al. proved that a strongly regular graph that contains a vertex with disconnected second neighborhood is a complete multipartite graph with parts of the same size greater than 2. In this paper, we study strictly Deza graphs with disconnected second neighborhoods of vertices. In Section 2, we prove that, if each vertex of a strictly Deza graph has disconnected second neighborhood, then the graph is either edge-regular or coedge-regular. In Sections 3 and 4, we consider strictly Deza graphs that contain at least one vertex with disconnected second neighborhood. In Section 3, we show that, if such a graph is edge-regular, then it is the s-coclique extension of a strongly regular graph with parameters (n, k, λ, μ), where s is an integer, s ≥ 2, and λ = μ. In Section 4, we show that, if such a graph is coedge-regular, then it is the 2-clique extension of a complete multipartite graph with parts of the same size greater than or equal to 3.     

Parity Dimension for Graphs - A Linear Algebraic Approach

For a graph G with closed neighborhood matrix N , the parity dimension of G , denoted PD( G ), is the dimension of the null space of N over the field ${\cal Z}_2$ . Equivalently, the number of vertex sets S in G with the property that S dominates each vertex an even number of times is 2 k for some value of k , and PD( G ) = k . Using primarily linear algebraic techniques, we investigate the parity dimension of graphs.     

Combining variable neighborhood search with integer linear programming for the generalized minimum spanning tree problem

We consider the generalized version of the classical Minimum Spanning Tree problem where the nodes of a graph are partitioned into clusters and exactly one node from each cluster must be connected. We present a Variable Neighborhood Search (VNS) approach which uses three different neighborhood types. Two of them work in complementary ways in order to maximize search effectivity. Both are large in the sense that they contain exponentially many candidate solutions, but efficient polynomial-time algorithms are used to identify best neighbors. For the third neighborhood type we apply Mixed Integer Programming to optimize local parts within candidate solution trees. Tests on Euclidean and random instances with up to 1280 nodes indicate especially on instances with many nodes per cluster significant advantages over previously published metaheuristic approaches. This work is supported by the RTN ADONET under grant 504438.     

A ranking for the nodes of directed graphs based on game theory (Poster Presentation)

We introduce a value that allows us to emphasize the importance of each player in a cooperative game when the cooperation possibilities are limited according to the links of an oriented network. The proposed concept of accessibility tries to conjugate the marginal contributions of each node as a game player with the cooperation geometry imposed by the directed graph that models the network. As a consequence, it is possible to offer a ranking for the nodes of directed graphs. (© 2008 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Marginal AMP chain graphs

We present a new family of models that is based on graphs that may have undirected, directed and bidirected edges. We name these new models marginal AMP (MAMP) chain graphs because each of them is Markov equivalent to some AMP chain graph under marginalization of some of its nodes. However, MAMP chain graphs do not only subsume AMP chain graphs but also multivariate regression chain graphs. We describe global and pairwise Markov properties for MAMP chain graphs and prove their equivalence for compositional graphoids. We also characterize when two MAMP chain graphs are Markov equivalent.For Gaussian probability distributions, we also show that every MAMP chain graph is Markov equivalent to some directed and acyclic graph with deterministic nodes under marginalization and conditioning on some of its nodes. This is important because it implies that the independence model represented by a MAMP chain graph can be accounted for by some data generating process that is partially observed and has selection bias. Finally, we modify MAMP chain graphs so that they are closed under marginalization for Gaussian probability distributions. This is a desirable feature because it guarantees parsimonious models under marginalization.     

Agent-based randomized broadcasting in large networks

Mobile agents are software abstractions that can migrate across the links of a network. They naturally extend the object oriented program style and nicely correspond to agents as examined in game theory. In this paper, we introduce a simple, robust, and efficient randomized broadcast protocol within this mobile agent programming paradigm. We show that by using this scheme, broadcasting enquiries in a random graph of certain density O(lnn) steps, where n denotes the number of nodes in the graph. Then, we consider bounded degree graphs and prove that we are able to distribute an information among all nodes in O(D) steps, where D denotes the diameter of the graph. We also show that, in contrast to traditional randomized broadcasting (TRB), graphs exist in which agent-based randomized broadcasting requires Ω(n²) steps. On the other hand, some graphs which require Ω(nlnn) steps to spread the information in the traditional broadcast model, allow very fast agent-based broadcasting. It should be noted that the previously mentioned results are guaranteed with probability 1-o(1/n).     

Neighborhood degree lists of graphs

The neighborhood degree list (NDL) is a graph invariant that refines information given by the degree sequence and joint degree matrix of a graph and is useful in distinguishing graphs having the same degree sequence. We show that the space of realizations of an NDL is connected via a switching operation. We then determine the NDLs that have a unique realization by a labeled graph; the characterization ties these NDLs and their realizations to the threshold graphs and difference graphs.     

On some balanced, totally balanced and submodular delivery games

This paper studies a class of delivery problems associated with the Chinese postman problem and a corresponding class of delivery games. A delivery problem in this class is determined by a connected graph, a cost function defined on its edges and a special chosen vertex in that graph which will be referred to as the post office. It is assumed that the edges in the graph are owned by different individuals and the delivery game is concerned with the allocation of the traveling costs incurred by the server, who starts at the post office and is expected to traverse all edges in the graph before returning to the post office. A graph G is called Chinese postman-submodular, or, for short, CP-submodular (CP-totally balanced, CP-balanced, respectively) if for each delivery problem in which G is the underlying graph the associated delivery game is submodular (totally balanced, balanced, respectively). For undirected graphs we prove that CP-submodular graphs and CP-totally balanced graphs are weakly cyclic graphs and conversely. An undirected graph is shown to be CP-balanced if and only if it is a weakly Euler graph. For directed graphs, CP-submodular graphs can be characterized by directed weakly cyclic graphs. Further, it is proven that any strongly connected directed graph is CP-balanced. For mixed graphs it is shown that a graph is CP-submodular if and only if it is a mixed weakly cyclic graph. Finally, we note that undirected, directed and mixed weakly cyclic graphs can be recognized in linear time. Received May 20, 1997 / Revised version received August 18, 1998?Published online June 11, 1999     

Games induced by the partitioning of a graph

The paper aims at generalizing the notion of restricted game on a communication graph, introduced by Myerson. We consider communication graphs with weighted edges, and we define arbitrary ways of partitioning any subset of a graph, which we call correspondences. A particularly useful way to partition a graph is obtained by computing the strength of the graph. The strength of a graph is a measure introduced in graph theory to evaluate the resistance of networks under attacks, and it provides a natural partition of the graph (called the Gusfield correspondence) into resistant components. We perform a general study of the inheritance of superadditivity and convexity for the restricted game associated with a given correspondence. Our main result is to give for cycle-free graphs necessary and sufficient conditions for the inheritance of convexity of the restricted game associated with the Gusfield correspondence.     

A solitaire game played on 2-colored graphs

We introduce a solitaire game played on a graph. Initially one disk is placed at each vertex, one face green and the other red, oriented with either color facing up. Each move of the game consists of selecting a vertex whose disk shows green, flipping over the disks at neighboring vertices, and deleting the selected vertex. The game is won if all vertices are eliminated. We derive a simple parity-based necessary condition for winnability of a given game instance. By studying graph operations that construct new graphs from old ones, we obtain broad classes of graphs where this condition also suffices, thus characterizing the winnable games on such graphs. Concerning two familiar (but narrow) classes of graphs, we show that for trees a game is winnable if and only if the number of green vertices is odd, and for n-cubes a game is winnable if and only if the number of green vertices is even and not all vertices have the same color. We provide a linear-time algorithm for deciding winnability for games on maximal outerplanar graphs. We reduce the decision problem for winnability of a game on an arbitrary graph G to winnability of games on its blocks, and to winnability on homeomorphic images of G obtained by contracting edges at 2-valent vertices.     

On the construction of the self-complementary graphs on 12 nodes

We briefly describe how we compiled a catalog of all the 720 self-complementary graphs on 12 nodes. In our first attempt at this compilation one graph was inadvertently omitted. The missing graph was subsequently found by making use of a theoretical formula due to Parthasarathy and Sridharan for counting self-complementary graphs with given partitions.     

Pretty good quantum state transfer in asymmetric graphs via potential

We construct infinite families of graphs in which pretty good state transfer can be induced by adding a potential to the nodes of the graph (i.e. adding a number to a diagonal entry of the adjacency matrix). Indeed, we show that given any graph with a pair of cospectral nodes, a simple modification of the graph, along with a suitable potential, yields pretty good state transfer between the nodes. This generalizes previous work, concerning graphs with an involution, to asymmetric graphs.     

Efficient indexing methods for recursive decompositions of Bayesian networks

We consider efficient indexing methods for conditioning graphs, which are a form of recursive decomposition for Bayesian networks. We compare two well-known methods for indexing, a top-down method and a bottom-up method, and discuss the redundancy that each of these suffer from. We present a new method for indexing that combines the advantages of each model in order to reduce this redundancy. We also introduce the concept of an update manager, which is a node in the conditioning graph that controls when other nodes update their current index. Empirical evaluations over a suite of standard test networks show a considerable reduction both in the amount of indexing computation that takes place, and the overall runtime required by the query algorithm.