Quick recalls

Moderately exponential approximation

Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Moderately exponential approximation

Bridging the gap between exact computation and
polynomial approximation

Vangelis Th. Paschos

BALCOR 2011

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

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 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Approximation ratio

Approximation ratio of an approximation algorithm A

value of the solution S computed by A on I

ρ(A, I, S) =
optimal value

The closer the ratio to 1, the better the performance of A

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 4 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Inapproximability

Inapproximability result
A statement that a problem is not approximable within ratios
better than some approximability level unless something very
unlikely happens in complexity theory
P = NP
Disproval of the ETH
...

ETH
SAT or one of its mates cannot be solved to optimality in
subexponential time

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 5 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Examples of inapproximability

MAX INDEPENDENT SET or MAX CLIQUE inapproximable

within ratios Ω n−1

MIN VERTEX COVER within ratios smaller than 2

MIN SET COVER within ratios o(log n)
MIN TSP within better than exponential ratios
MIN COLORING within ratios o(n)
...

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 6 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Guiding thread of the talk

The MAX INDEPENDENT SET problem

MAX INDEPENDENT SET

Given a graph G(V , E ) we look for a maximum size V ′ ⊆ V
such that ∀(vi , vj ) ∈ V ′ × V ′ , (vi , vj ) ∈
/E

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 7 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Exact computation with worst-case bounds (1)

Determine an optimal solution for an NP-hard problem with

provably non trivial worst-case time-complexity

For MAX INDEPENDENT SET

Exhaustively generate any subset of V and get a maximum

one among those that are independent sets: O (2n ) (trivial
exact complexity)
Find all the maximal independent sets of the input
graph: O (1.4422n ) (Moon & Moser (1965))

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 8 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Exact computation with worst-case bounds (2):

pruning the search tree

(a) 1 vertex fixed (b) > 4 vertices

fixed

T (n) 6 T (n − 1) + T (n − 4) + p(n) ≃ O (1.385n )

→ Numerous subsequent improvements

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 9 / 31

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

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2 Moderately exponential approximation

3 Techniques for moderately exponential approximation

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 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

A basic question (goal = max)

ratio ρ 1

polynomial exact
algorithms algorithms
GAP

What about GAP?

Why not taking advantage of the power of modern
computers?
For realistic values of n, 1.1n is not so “worse” than, say, n5

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 11 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

The key issue

Approximate optimal solutions of NP-hard problems within

ratios “forbidden” to polynomial algorithms and with
worst-case complexity provably better than the complexity
of an exact computation

Do it
For some forbidden ratio
For any forbidden ratio

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 12 / 31

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

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3 Techniques for moderately exponential approximation

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Generate a small number of candidates (1)

The key-idea
Generate a small number of candidate solutions (polynomially
complete them, if necessary and possible) and return the best
among them

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Generate a small number of candidates (2): MAX

INDEPENDENT SET

√
Generate all the n-subsets of V
If one of them is independent, then return it
Else return a vertex at random

Approximation ratio: n−1/2 (impossible in polynomial time)


  √ 
Worst-case complexity: O √nn 6 O 2 n log n
Subexponential

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 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Generate a small number of candidates (2): works

also for . . .

MIN INDEPENDENT DOMINATING SET (Bourgeois,

Escoffier & P (2010))
CAPACITATED DOMINATING SET (Cygan, Pilipczuk &
Wojtaszczyk (2010))

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 16 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Divide & approximate (1)

The key-idea
Optimally solve a problem in a series of (small) sub-instances
of the initial instance

Appropriately split the instance in a set of sub-instances

(whose sizes are functions of the ratio that is to be
achieved)
Solve the problem in this set
Compose a solution for the initial instance using the
solutions of the sub-instances

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 17 / 31

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Divide & approximate (2): MAX INDEPENDENT SET

Theorem
Assume that an optimal solution for MAX INDEPENDENT SET
can be found in O (γn )
 p p,q, p < q, a (p/q)-approximation can be
Then, for any fixed
n
computed in O γ q

It works for any problem defined upon a hereditary property

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 18 / 31

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Divide & approximate (3)

Build the unions of all the p subgraphs in {G1 , . . . , Gq }

among q
Take the best among these qp solutions

p
G

Gi

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 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Divide & approximate (4): example for p/q = r = 1/2

G1 S∗ G2 G

S1∗ S2∗

 ∗   ∗ 
max S  , S  1
1 2
|S ∗ | 6 |S1∗ | + |S2∗ | 6 2 max {|S1∗ | , |S2∗ |} =⇒ >
|S |
∗ 2

Complexity: O γn/2

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 20 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Divide & approximate (5): works also for . . .

If O (γn ) the complexity for MAX INDEPENDENT SET

MIN VERTEX COVER : (2 − r )-approximation in O (γrn ), for
any r (Bourgeois, Escoffier & P (2011))
MAX CLIQUE : r -approximation in O γr ∆ (∆ the maximum

degree of the input-graph), for any r (Bourgeois,

Escoffier & P (2011))
MAX SET PACKING : r -approximation in O (γrn ), for any r
(Bourgeois, Escoffier & P (2011))
MAX BIPARTITE SUBGRAPH : r -approximation in O γ2rn , for

any r (Bourgeois, Escoffier & P (2011))

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 21 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Approximately pruning the search tree (1)

The key idea

Perform a branch-and-cut by allowing a “bounded error” in
order to accelerate the algorithm (i.e., make the instance-size
decreasing quicker than in exact computation by keeping the
produced error “small”)

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 22 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Approximately pruning the search tree (2): MAX

INDEPENDENT SET

1 If ∆(G) 6 7, then approximate MAX INDEPENDENT SET

polynomially;
2 else, branch on a vertex v with d (v) > 8 and either take it,
remove its neighbors and two more vertices vi , vj such that
(vi , vj ) ∈ E , or do not take it

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Approximately pruning the search tree (3): MAX

INDEPENDENT SET (cont.)

Theorem
The above algorithm computes an 12 -approximation for MAX
INDEPENDENT SET in time O (1.185n )

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 24 / 31

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Approximately pruning the search tree (4): MAX

INDEPENDENT SET (cont.)

1 5
If ∆(G) 6 7, approximation ratio 2 (ratio ∆(G)+3 , (Berman &
Fujito (1985)))
If ∆(G) > 8, we make an “error” of at most 1 vertex per
vertex introduced in the solution (ratio 12 )

Complexity
T (n) 6 T (n − 1) + T (n − 11) + p(n) = O (1.185n )

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 25 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Approximately pruning the search tree (5): works also

for . . .

MIN SET COVER (Bourgeois, Escoffier & P (2009))

BANDWIDTH (Cygan & Pilipczuk (2010))
MIN and MAX SAT (Escoffier, P & Tourniaire (2011))

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 26 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Randomization

The key idea

Achieving ratio r with complexity better than O (γrn )
Randomly split the graph into subgraphs in such a way that
the problem at hand is to be solved in graphs Gi′ of
order r ′ n with r ′ < r
Compute the probability Pr[r ] of an r -approximation
Repeat splitting N(r ) times to bet r-approximation with
′
probability ∼ 1 (in time N(r )γr n )

It works for MAX INDEPENDENT SET, MIN VERTEX COVER , MIN

SET COVER , ...

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 27 / 31

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

1 Quick recalls

2 Moderately exponential approximation

3 Techniques for moderately exponential approximation

4 Some questions

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Is subexponential approximation possible?

MIN COLORING

polynomially inapproximable within χ(G)+1

χ(G) (Garey &
Johnson (1979)) but exponentially approximable
within χ(G)+1
χ(G) ((Björklund, Husfeldt & Koivisto (2006)),
(Bourgeois, Escoffier & P (2009)))

If it is subexponentially approximable within better than χ(G)+1

χ(G) ,
then MIN COLORING is solvable in subexponential time!!!

DISPROVAL OF THE ETH FOR MIN COLORING !!!!

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 29 / 31

 Quick recalls
Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

Further questions: structure of moderately exponential

approximation

More tools proper to moderately exponential approximation

Moderately exponential approximation preserving
reductions?
Is it possible to get inapproximability results?
Of what kind?
Under what complexity conditions?

Vangelis Th. Paschos Moderately exponential approximation 30 / 31

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Moderately exponential approximation
Techniques for moderately exponential approximation
Some questions

E Υ X A P I Σ T Ω

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