We show that graphs that do not contain a theta, pyramid, prism, or turtle as an induced subgraph have polynomially many minimal separators. This result is the best possible in the sense that there are graphs with exponentially many minimal separators if only three of the four induced subgraphs are excluded. As a consequence, there is a polynomial time algorithm to solve the maximum weight independent set problem for the class of (theta, pyramid, prism, turtle)-free graphs. Since every prism, theta, and turtle contains an even hole, this also implies a polynomial time algorithm to solve the maximum weight independent set problem for the class of (pyramid, even hole)-free graphs.
Minimal separators in graphs are an important concept in algorithmic graph theory. In particular, many problems that are NP-hard for general graphs are known to become polynomial-time solvable for classes of graphs with a polynomially bounded number of minimal separators. Several well-known graph classes have this property, including chordal graphs, permutation graphs, circular-arc graphs, and circle graphs. We perform a systematic study of the question which classes of graphs defined by small forbidden induced subgraphs have a polynomially bounded number of minimal separators. We focus on set…
We prove that for a connected simple graph $G$ with $n\le 10$ vertices, and two longest paths $C$ and $D$ in $G$, the intersection of vertex sets $V(C)\cap V(D)$ is a separator. This shows that the graph found previously with $n=11$, in which the complement of the intersection of vertex sets $V(C)\cap V(D)$ of two longest paths is connected, is minimal.
The Known Menger's theorem states that in a finite graph, the size of a minimum separator set of any pair of vertices is equal to the maximum number of disjoint paths that can be found between these two vertices. In this paper, we study the minimal separators of two non-adjacent vertices in a finite graph, and we give a new elementary proof of Menger's theorem.
A connected graph is 2K2-free if it does not contain a pair of independent edges as an induced subgraph. In this paper, we present the structural characterization of minimal vertex separator and show that there are polynomial number of minimal vertex separators in 2K2-free graphs. Further, using the enumeration we show that finding minimum connected vertex separator in 2K2-free graphs is polynomial time solvable. We highlight that finding minimum connected vertex separator is NP-complete in Chordality 5 graphs, which is a super graph class of 2K2-free graphs. Other study includes, enumeration …
We consider the largest number of minimal separators a graph on n vertices can have at most. We give a new proof that this number is in $O( ((1+\sqrt{5})/2)^n n )$. We prove that this number is in $ω( 1.4521^n )$, improving on the previous best lower bound of $Ω(3^{n/3}) \subseteq ω( 1.4422^n )$. This gives also an improved lower bound on the number of potential maximal cliques in a graph. We would like to emphasize that our proofs are short, simple, and elementary.
A graph is called $P_t$-free} if it does not contain a $t$-vertex path as an induced subgraph. While $P_4$-free graphs are exactly cographs, the structure of $P_t$-free graphs for $t \geq 5$ remains little understood. On one hand, classic computational problems such as Maximum Weight Independent Set (MWIS) and $3$-Coloring are not known to be NP-hard on $P_t$-free graphs for any fixed $t$. On the other hand, despite significant effort, polynomial-time algorithms for MWIS in $P_6$-free graphs~[SODA 2019] and $3$-Coloring in $P_7$-free graphs~[Combinatorica 2018] have been found only recently. I…
In this paper we study the algebra of graph invariants, focusing mainly on the invariants of simple graphs. All other invariants, such as sorted eigenvalues, degree sequences and canonical permutations, belong to this algebra. In fact, every graph invariant is a linear combination of the basic graph invariants which we study in this paper. To prove that two graphs are isomorphic, a number of basic invariants are required, which are called separator invariants. The minimal set of separator invariants is also the minimal basic generator set for the algebra of graph invariants. We find lower and …
A class ${\cal F}$ of graphs is called {\em tame} if there exists a constant $k$ so that every graph in ${\cal F}$ on $n$ vertices contains at most $O(n^k)$ minimal separators, {\em strongly-quasi-tame} if every graph in ${\cal F}$ on $n$ vertices contains at most $O(n^{k \log n})$ minimal separators, and {\em feral} if there exists a constant $c > 1$ so that ${\cal F}$ contains $n$-vertex graphs with at least $c^n$ minimal separators for arbitrarily large $n$. The classification of graph classes into tame or feral has numerous algorithmic consequences, and has recently received considerable a…
Yannakakis' Clique versus Independent Set problem (CL-IS) in communication complexity asks for the minimum number of cuts separating cliques from stable sets in a graph, called CS-separator. Yannakakis provides a quasi-polynomial CS-separator, i.e. of size $O(n^{\log n})$, and addresses the problem of finding a polynomial CS-separator. This question is still open even for perfect graphs. We show that a polynomial CS-separator almost surely exists for random graphs. Besides, if H is a split graph (i.e. has a vertex-partition into a clique and a stable set) then there exists a constant $c_H$ for…
Kloks, Kratsch, and Spinrad showed how treewidth and minimum-fill, NP-hard combinatorial optimization problems related to minimal triangulations, are broken into subproblems by block subgraphs defined by minimal separators. These ideas were expanded on by Bouchitté and Todinca, who used potential maximal cliques to solve these problems using a dynamic programming approach in time polynomial in the number of minimal separators of a graph. It is known that solutions to the perfect phylogeny problem, maximum compatibility problem, and unique perfect phylogeny problem are characterized by minimal …
We say that a first order formula $Φ$ defines a graph $G$ if $Φ$ is true on $G$ and false on every graph $G'$ non-isomorphic with $G$. Let $D(G)$ be the minimal quantifier rank of a such formula. We prove that, if $G$ is a tree of bounded degree or a Hamiltonian (equivalently, 2-connected) outerplanar graph, then $D(G)=O(\log n)$, where $n$ denotes the order of $G$. This bound is optimal up to a constant factor. If $h$ is a constant, for connected graphs with no minor $K_h$ and degree $O(\sqrt n/\log n)$, we prove the bound $D(G)=O(\sqrt n)$. This result applies to planar graphs and, more gene…
We confirm a conjecture of Gartland and Lokshtanov [arXiv:2007.08761]: if for a hereditary graph class $\mathcal{G}$ there exists a constant $k$ such that no member of $\mathcal{G}$ contains a $k$-creature as an induced subgraph or a $k$-skinny-ladder as an induced minor, then there exists a polynomial $p$ such that every $G \in \mathcal{G}$ contains at most $p(|V(G)|)$ minimal separators. By a result of Fomin, Todinca, and Villanger [SIAM J. Comput. 2015] the latter entails the existence of polynomial-time algorithms for Maximum Weight Independent Set, Feedback Vertex Set and many other probl…
In this paper, we study minimal (with respect to inclusion) zero forcing sets. We first investigate when a graph can have polynomially or exponentially many distinct minimal zero forcing sets. We also study the maximum size of a minimal zero forcing set $\overline{\operatorname{Z}}(G)$, and relate it to the zero forcing number $\operatorname{Z}(G)$. Surprisingly, we show that the equality $\overline{\operatorname{Z}}(G)=\operatorname{Z}(G)$ is preserved by deleting a universal vertex, but not by adding a universal vertex. We also characterize graphs with extreme values of $\overline{\operatorn…
A dominating set $D$ in a graph is a subset of its vertex set such that each vertex is either in $D$ or has a neighbour in $D$. In this paper, we are interested in the enumeration of (inclusion-wise) minimal dominating sets in graphs, called the Dom-Enum problem. It is well known that this problem can be polynomially reduced to the Trans-Enum problem in hypergraphs, i.e., the problem of enumerating all minimal transversals in a hypergraph. Firstly we show that the Trans-Enum problem can be polynomially reduced to the Dom-Enum problem. As a consequence there exists an output-polynomial time alg…
Let $G$ be a graph. A set $S$ of vertices in $G$ dominates the graph if every vertex of $G$ is either in $S$ or a neighbor of a vertex in $S$. Finding a minimal cardinality set which dominates the graph is an NP-complete problem. The graph $G$ is well-dominated if all its minimal dominating sets are of the same cardinality. The complexity status of recognizing well-dominated graphs is not known. We show that recognizing well-dominated graphs can be done polynomially for graphs without cycles of lengths $4$ and $5$, by proving that a graph belonging to this family is well-dominated if and only …
A \emph{hole} in a graph is an induced cycle with at least 4 vertices. A graph is \emph{even-hole-free} if it does not contain a hole on an even number of vertices. A \emph{pyramid} is a graph made of three chordless paths $P_1 = a \dots b_1$, $P_2 = a \dots b_2$, $P_3 = a \dots b_3$ of length at least~1, two of which have length at least 2, vertex-disjoint except at $a$, and such that $b_1b_2b_3$ is a triangle and no edges exist between the paths except those of the triangle and the three edges incident with $a$. We give a polynomial time algorithm to compute a maximum weighted independent se…
A connected dominating set in a graph is a dominating set of vertices that induces a connected subgraph. Following analogous studies in the literature related to independent sets, dominating sets, and total dominating sets, we study in this paper the class of graphs in which the connected dominating sets can be separated from the other vertex subsets by a linear weight function. More precisely, we say that a graph is connected-domishold if it admits non-negative real weights associated to its vertices such that a set of vertices is a connected dominating set if and only if the sum of the corre…
