Bounding the number of bases of a matroid

Letb(M) andc(M), respectively, be the number of bases and circuits of a matroidM. For any given minor closed class? of matroids, the following two questions, are investigated in this paper. (1) When is there a polynomial functionp(x) such thatb(M)≤p(c(m)|E(M)|) for every matroidM in?? (2) When is there a polynomial functionp(x) such thatb(M)≤p(|E(M)|) for every matroidM in?? Let us denote byM _Mn the direct sum ofn copies ofU _1,2. We prove that the answer to the first question is affirmative if and only if someM _Mn is not in?. Furthermore, if all the members of? are representable over a fixed finite field, then we prove that the answer to the second question is affirmative if and only if, also, someM _Mn is not in?.     

Weight distribution of the bases of a binary matroid

Let M be a weighted binary matroid and w₁ < … < w_m be the increasing sequence of all possible distinct weights of bases of M. We give a sufficient condition for the property that w₁, …, w_m is an arithmetical progression of common difference d. We also give conditions which guarantee that w_i+1 − w_i ≤ d, 1 ≤ i ≤ m −1. Dual forms for these results are given also.     

Extended formulations for matroid polytopes through randomized protocols

The hitting number of a polytope P is the smallest size of a subset of vertices of P such that every facet of P has a vertex in the subset. We show that, if P is the base polytope of any matroid, then P admits an extended formulation of linear size on the hitting number of P. Our results generalize those of the spanning tree polytope given by Martin and Wong, and extend to polymatroids.     

Random sampling and greedy sparsification for matroid optimization problems

Random sampling is a powerful tool for gathering information about a group by considering only a small part of it. We discuss some broadly applicable paradigms for using random sampling in combinatorial optimization, and demonstrate the effectiveness of these paradigms for two optimization problems on matroids: finding an optimum matroid basis and packing disjoint matroid bases. Application of these ideas to the graphic matroid led to fast algorithms for minimum spanning trees and minimum cuts. An optimum matroid basis is typically found by agreedy algorithm that grows an independent set into an optimum basis one element at a time. This continuous change in the independent set can make it hard to perform the independence tests needed by the greedy algorithm. We simplify matters by using sampling to reduce the problem of finding an optimum matroid basis to the problem of verifying that a givenfixed basis is optimum, showing that the two problems can be solved in roughly the same time. Another application of sampling is to packing matroid bases, also known as matroid partitioning. Sampling reduces the number of bases that must be packed. We combine sampling with a greedy packing strategy that reduces the size of the matroid. Together, these techniques give accelerated packing algorithms. We give particular attention to the problem of packing spanning trees in graphs, which has applications in network reliability analysis. Our results can be seen as generalizing certain results from random graph theory. The techniques have also been effective for other packing problems. © 1998 The Mathematical Programming Society, Inc. Published by Elsevier Science B.V.Some of this work done at Stanford University, supported by National Science Foundation and Hertz Foundation Graduate Fellowships, and NSF Young Investigator Award CCR-9357849, with matching funds from IBM, Schlumberger Foundation, Shell Foundation and Xerox Corporation. Also supported by NSF award 962-4239.     

A new formula for an evaluation of the Tutte polynomial of a matroid

Given a matroid M and its Tutte polynomial T_M(x,y), T_M(0,1) is an invariant of M with various interesting combinatorial and topological interpretations. Being a Tutte–Grothendieck invariant, T_M(0,1) may be computed via deletion–contraction recursions. In this note we derive a new recursion formula for this invariant that involves contractions of M through the circuits containing a fixed element of M.     

On the number of circuit–cocircuit reversal classes of an oriented matroid

The first author introduced the circuit–cocircuit reversal system of an oriented matroid, and showed that when the underlying matroid is regular, the cardinalities of such system and its variations are equal to special evaluations of the Tutte polynomial (e.g., the total number of circuit–cocircuit reversal classes equals $t(M;1,1)$, the number of bases of the matroid). By relating these classes to activity classes studied by the first author and Las Vergnas, we give an alternative proof of the above results and a proof of the converse statements that these equalities fail whenever the underlying matroid is not regular. Hence we extend the above results to an equivalence of matroidal properties, thereby giving a new characterization of regular matroids.     

Solving the linear matroid parity problem as a sequence of matroid intersection problems

In this paper, we present an O(r ⁴ n) algorithm for the linear matroid parity problem. Our solution technique is to introduce a modest generalization, the non-simple parity problem, and identify an important subclass of non-simple parity problems called easy parity problems which can be solved as matroid intersection problems. We then show how to solve any linear matroid parity problem parametrically as a sequence of easy parity problems.In contrast to other algorithmic work on this problem, we focus on general structural properties of dual solutions rather than on local primal structures. In a companion paper, we develop these ideas into a duality theory for the parity problem.     

Equivalence-free exhaustive generation of matroid representations

In this paper we present an algorithm for the problem of exhaustive equivalence-free generation of 3-connected matroids which are represented by a matrix over some finite (partial) field, and which contain a given minor. The nature of this problem is exponential, and it appears to be much harder than, say, isomorph-free generation of graphs. Still, our algorithm is very suitable for practical use, and it has been successfully implemented in our matroid computing package MACEK [http://www.mcs.vuw.ac.nz/research/macek, 2001-05].     

On the (co)girth of a connected matroid

This article studies the girth and cogirth problems for a connected matroid. The problem of finding the cogirth of a graphic matroid has been intensively studied, but studies on the equivalent problem for a vector matroid or a general matroid have been rarely reported. Based on the duality and connectivity of a matroid, we prove properties associated with the girth and cogirth of a matroid whose contraction or restriction is disconnected. Then, we devise algorithms that find the cogirth of a matroid M from the matroids associated with the direct sum components of the restriction of M. As a result, the problem of finding the (co)girth of a matroid can be decomposed into a set of smaller sub-problems, which helps alleviate the computation. Finally, we implement and demonstrate the application of our algorithms to vector matroids.     

Complementary bases of a matroid

Let e₁, e′₁, e₂, e′₂, …, e_n, e′_n be the elements of matroid M. Suppose that {e₁, e₂, …;, e_n} is a base of M and that every circuit of M contains at least m + 1 elements. We prove that there exist at least 2^m bases, called complementary bases, of M with the property that only one of each complementary pair e_j, e′_j is contained in any base.We also prove an analogous result for the case where E is partitioned into E₁, E₂, …, E_n and the initial base contains |E_j| ? 1 elements from partition E_j.     

The independence number condition for the existence of a spanning f‐tree

Let G be a graph and f be a mapping from V(G) to the positive integers. A subgraph T of G is called an f‐tree if T forms a tree and d_T(x)≤f(x) for any x∈V(T). We propose a conjecture on the existence of a spanning f‐tree, and give a partial solution to it. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 65: 173–184, 2010     

Persistency and matroid intersection

In this paper, we show that for any independence system, the problem of finding a persistency partition of the ground set and that of finding a maximum weight independent set are polynomially equivalent. This research has been partially funded by the Greek Ministry of Education under the program Pythagoras.     

Envy-free matchings with one-sided preferences and matroid constraints

In this paper, we consider the problem of checking the existence of an envy-free matching in a many-to-one matching model with one-sided preferences and matroid constraints. For this problem, we propose a polynomial-time algorithm which is a generalization of the algorithm proposed by Gan, Suksompong, and Voudouris for the one-to-one setting. Furthermore, we consider a stronger variant of envy-freeness.     

A matroid operation that commutes with duality

In this note, we propose an operation for matroids that commutes with duality having deletions and contractions as extremal cases. Crapo and Schmitt's free product of matroids is one of its consequences. A special case of this operation can be used as an inductive tool because it reduces the number of elements of a matroid by two and it is invariant by duality.     

k-Best constrained bases of a matroid

We propose a method for finding a set ofk-best bases of an arbitrary matroid where the bases are required to satisfy additional partitionlike constraints. An application of this problem is discussed.Research partly supported by Sonderforschungsbereich 303 der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft and by the Austrian Science Foundation, Project P6004.