The maximum edit distance from hereditary graph properties

For a graph property , the edit distance of a graph G from , denoted , is the minimum number of edge modifications (additions or deletions) one needs to apply to G in order to turn it into a graph satisfying . What is the largest possible edit distance of a graph on n vertices from ? Denote this distance by .A graph property is hereditary if it is closed under removal of vertices. In a previous work, the authors show that for any hereditary property, a random graph essentially achieves the maximal distance from , proving: with high probability. The proof implicitly asserts the existence of such , but it does not supply a general tool for determining its value or the edit distance.In this paper, we determine the values of and for some subfamilies of hereditary properties including sparse hereditary properties, complement invariant properties, (r,s)-colorability and more. We provide methods for analyzing the maximum edit distance from the graph properties of being induced H-free for some graphs H, and use it to show that in some natural cases G(n,1/2) is not the furthest graph. Throughout the paper, the various tools let us deduce the asymptotic maximum edit distance from some well studied hereditary graph properties, such as being Perfect, Chordal, Interval, Permutation, Claw-Free, Cograph and more. We also determine the edit distance of G(n,1/2) from any hereditary property, and investigate the behavior of as a function of p.The proofs combine several tools in Extremal Graph Theory, including strengthened versions of the Szemerédi Regularity Lemma, Ramsey Theory and properties of random graphs.     

A dynamic edit distance table

In this paper we consider the incremental/decremental version of the edit distance problem: given a solution to the edit distance between two strings A and B, find a solution to the edit distance between A and B′ where B′=aB (incremental) or bB′=B (decremental). As a solution for the edit distance between A and B, we define the difference representation of the D-table, which leads to a simple and intuitive algorithm for the incremental/decremental edit distance problem.     

On the editing distance of graphs

An edge‐operation on a graph G is defined to be either the deletion of an existing edge or the addition of a nonexisting edge. Given a family of graphs , the editing distance from G to is the smallest number of edge‐operations needed to modify G into a graph from . In this article, we fix a graph H and consider Forb(n, H), the set of all graphs on n vertices that have no induced copy of H. We provide bounds for the maximum over all n‐vertex graphs G of the editing distance from G to Forb(n, H), using an invariant we call the binary chromatic number of the graph H. We give asymptotically tight bounds for that distance when H is self‐complementary and exact results for several small graphs H. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 58:123–138, 2008     

Distance measures based on the edit distance for permutation-type representations

In this paper, we discuss distance measures for a number of different combinatorial optimization problems of which the solutions are best represented as permutations of items, sometimes composed of several permutation (sub)sets. The problems discussed include single-machine and multiple-machine scheduling problems, the traveling salesman problem, vehicle routing problems, and many others. Each of these problems requires a different distance measure that takes the specific properties of the representation into account. The distance measures discussed in this paper are based on a general distance measure for string comparison called the edit distance. We introduce several extensions to the simple edit distance, that can be used when a solution cannot be represented as a simple permutation, and develop algorithms to calculate them efficiently.     

Applying an edit distance to the matching of tree ring sequences in dendrochronology

In dendrochronology wood samples are dated according to the tree rings they contain. The dating process consists of comparing the sequence of tree ring widths in the sample to a dated master sequence. Assuming that a tree forms exactly one ring per year a simple sliding algorithm solves this matching task.

But sometimes a tree produces no ring or even two rings in a year. If a sample sequence contains this kind of inconsistencies it cannot be dated correctly by the simple sliding algorithm. We therefore introduce a algorithm for dating such a sample sequence against an error-free master sequence, where n and m are the lengths of the sequences. Our algorithm takes into account that the sample might contain up to missing or double rings and suggests possible positions for these kind of inconsistencies. This is done by employing an edit distance as the distance measure.     

Decomposition algorithms for the tree edit distance problem

We study the behavior of dynamic programming methods for the tree edit distance problem, such as [P. Klein, Computing the edit-distance between unrooted ordered trees, in: Proceedings of 6th European Symposium on Algorithms, 1998, p. 91–102; K. Zhang, D. Shasha, SIAM J. Comput. 18 (6) (1989) 1245–1262]. We show that those two algorithms may be described as decomposition strategies. We introduce the general framework of cover strategies, and we provide an exact characterization of the complexity of cover strategies. This analysis allows us to define a new tree edit distance algorithm, that is optimal for cover strategies.     

A result on the total colouring of powers of cycles

The total chromatic number χ_T(G) is the least number of colours needed to colour the vertices and edges of a graph G such that no incident or adjacent elements (vertices or edges) receive the same colour. The Total Colouring Conjecture (TCC) states that for every simple graph G, χ_T(G)?Δ(G)+2. This work verifies the TCC for powers of cycles even and 2<k<n/2, showing that there exists and can be polynomially constructed a (Δ(G)+2)-total colouring for these graphs.     

Efficient exponential-time algorithms for edit distance between unordered trees

The edit distance problem for rooted unordered trees is known to be NP-hard. Based on this fact, this paper studies exponential-time algorithms for the problem. For a general case, an $O(\min ({1.26}^{n_1+n_2},2^{b_1+b_2}\cdot \text{<mi mathvariant="italic" is="true">poly</mi>}(n_1,n_2)))$ time algorithm is presented, where $n_1$ and $n_2$ are the numbers of nodes and $b_1$ and $b_2$ are the numbers of branching nodes in two input trees. This algorithm is obtained by a combination of dynamic programming, exhaustive search, and maximum weighted bipartite matching. For bounded degree trees over a fixed alphabet, it is shown that the problem can be solved in $O({(1+ϵ)}^{n_1+n_2})$ time for any fixed $ϵ>0$. This result is achieved by avoiding duplicate calculations for identical subsets of small subtrees.     

On the maximum number of cycles in a planar graph

Let G be a graph on p vertices with q edges and let r = q ? p = 1. We show that G has at most cycles. We also show that if G is planar, then G has at most 2^{r ? 1} = o(2^{r ? 1}) cycles. The planar result is best possible in the sense that any prism, that is, the Cartesian product of a cycle and a path with one edge, has more than 2^{r ? 1} cycles. © Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Graph Theory 57: 255–264, 2008     

On the girth of extremal graphs without shortest cycles

Let EX(ν;{C₃,…,C_n}) denote the set of graphs G of order ν that contain no cycles of length less than or equal to n which have maximum number of edges. In this paper we consider a problem posed by several authors: does G contain an n+1 cycle? We prove that the diameter of G is at most n−1, and present several results concerning the above question: the girth of G is g=n+1 if (i) ν≥n+5, diameter equal to n−1 and minimum degree at least 3; (ii) ν≥12, ν∉{15,80,170} and n=6. Moreover, if ν=15 we find an extremal graph of girth 8 obtained from a 3-regular complete bipartite graph subdividing its edges. (iii) We prove that if ν≥2n−3 and n≥7 the girth is at most 2n−5. We also show that the answer to the question is negative for ν≤n+1+⌊(n−2)/2⌋.     

Properly colored hamilton cycles in edge-colored complete graphs

It is shown that, for ϵ>0 and n>n₀(ϵ), any complete graph K on n vertices whose edges are colored so that no vertex is incident with more than (1-1/\sqrt2-\epsilon)n edges of the same color contains a Hamilton cycle in which adjacent edges have distinct colors. Moreover, for every k between 3 and n any such K contains a cycle of length k in which adjacent edges have distinct colors. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 11 , 179–186 (1997)     

Heavy cycles in 2-connected triangle-free weighted graphs

A weighted graph is one in which every edge e is assigned a nonnegative number, called the weight of e. The sum of the weights of the edges incident with a vertex v is called the weighted degree of v, denoted by dw(v). The weight of a cycle is defined as the sum of the weights of its edges. Fujisawa proved that if G is a 2-connected triangle-free weighted graph such that the minimum weighted degree of G is at least d, then G contains a cycle of weight at least 2d. In this paper, we proved that if G is a2-connected triangle-free weighted graph of even size such that dw(u) + dw(v) ≥ 2d holds for any pair of nonadjacent vertices u, v ∈ V(G), then G contains a cycle of weight at least 2d.     

Hamilton cycles in prisms

The prism over a graph G is the Cartesian product G □ K₂ of G with the complete graph K₂. If G is hamiltonian, then G□K₂ is also hamiltonian but the converse does not hold in general. Having a hamiltonian prism is shown to be an interesting relaxation of being hamiltonian. In this article, we examine classical problems on hamiltonicity of graphs in the context of having a hamiltonian prism. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 56: 249–269, 2007     

Compatible Hamilton cycles in random graphs

A graph is Hamiltonian if it contains a cycle passing through every vertex. One of the cornerstone results in the theory of random graphs asserts that for edge probability , the random graph G(n, p) is asymptotically almost surely Hamiltonian. We obtain the following strengthening of this result. Given a graph , an incompatibility system over G is a family where for every , the set F_v is a set of unordered pairs . An incompatibility system is Δ‐bounded if for every vertex v and an edge e incident to v, there are at most Δ pairs in F_v containing e. We say that a cycle C in G is compatible with if every pair of incident edges of C satisfies . This notion is partly motivated by a concept of transition systems defined by Kotzig in 1968, and can be used as a quantitative measure of robustness of graph properties. We prove that there is a constant such that the random graph with is asymptotically almost surely such that for any μnp‐bounded incompatibility system over G, there is a Hamilton cycle in G compatible with . We also prove that for larger edge probabilities , the parameter μ can be taken to be any constant smaller than . These results imply in particular that typically in G(n, p) for , for any edge‐coloring in which each color appears at most μnp times at each vertex, there exists a properly colored Hamilton cycle. Furthermore, our proof can be easily modified to show that for any edge‐coloring of such a random graph in which each color appears on at most μnp edges, there exists a Hamilton cycle in which all edges have distinct colors (i.e., a rainbow Hamilton cycle). © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 49, 533–557, 2016     

Partitioning a graph into convex sets

Let G be a finite simple graph. Let S⊆V(G), its closed interval I[S] is the set of all vertices lying on shortest paths between any pair of vertices of S. The set S is convex if I[S]=S. In this work we define the concept of a convex partition of graphs. If there exists a partition of V(G) into p convex sets we say that G is p-convex. We prove that it is NP-complete to decide whether a graph G is p-convex for a fixed integer p≥2. We show that every connected chordal graph is p-convex, for 1≤p≤n. We also establish conditions on n and k to decide if the k-th power of a cycle C_n is p-convex. Finally, we develop a linear-time algorithm to decide if a cograph is p-convex.