Algorithms for Measuring Perturbability in Matroid Optimization

perturbability function of a matroid measures the maximum increase in the weight of its minimum weight bases that can be produced by increases of a given total cost on the weights of its elements. We present an algorithm for computing this function that runs in strongly polynomial time for matroids in which independence can be tested in strongly polynomial time. Furthermore, for the case of transversal matroids we are able to take advantage of their special structure to design a faster algorithm for computing the perturbability function. Received: June 13, 1997