The Parameterized Complexity Landscape of Two-Sets Cut-Uncut

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Bentert, Matthias, Fomin, Fedor V., Hauser, Fanny, Saurabh, Saket
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Bentert, Matthias
Fomin, Fedor V.
Hauser, Fanny
Saurabh, Saket
author_facet Bentert, Matthias
Fomin, Fedor V.
Hauser, Fanny
Saurabh, Saket
contents In Two-Sets Cut-Uncut, we are given an undirected graph $G=(V,E)$ and two terminal sets $S$ and $T$. The task is to find a minimum cut $C$ in $G$ (if there is any) separating $S$ from $T$ under the following ``uncut'' condition. In the graph $(V,E \setminus C)$, the terminals in each terminal set remain in the same connected component. In spite of the superficial similarity to the classic problem Minimum $s$-$t$-Cut, Two-Sets Cut-Uncut is computationally challenging. In particular, even deciding whether such a cut of any size exists, is already NP-complete. We initiate a systematic study of Two-Sets Cut-Uncut within the context of parameterized complexity. By leveraging known relations between many well-studied graph parameters, we characterize the structural properties of input graphs that allow for polynomial kernels, fixed-parameter tractability (FPT), and slicewise polynomial algorithms (XP). Our main contribution is the near-complete establishment of the complexity of these algorithmic properties within the described hierarchy of graph parameters. On a technical level, our main results are fixed-parameter tractability for the (vertex-deletion) distance to cographs and an OR-cross composition excluding polynomial kernels for the vertex cover number of the input graph (under the standard complexity assumption NP is not contained in coNP/poly).
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2408_13543
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle The Parameterized Complexity Landscape of Two-Sets Cut-Uncut
Bentert, Matthias
Fomin, Fedor V.
Hauser, Fanny
Saurabh, Saket
Data Structures and Algorithms
Discrete Mathematics
In Two-Sets Cut-Uncut, we are given an undirected graph $G=(V,E)$ and two terminal sets $S$ and $T$. The task is to find a minimum cut $C$ in $G$ (if there is any) separating $S$ from $T$ under the following ``uncut'' condition. In the graph $(V,E \setminus C)$, the terminals in each terminal set remain in the same connected component. In spite of the superficial similarity to the classic problem Minimum $s$-$t$-Cut, Two-Sets Cut-Uncut is computationally challenging. In particular, even deciding whether such a cut of any size exists, is already NP-complete. We initiate a systematic study of Two-Sets Cut-Uncut within the context of parameterized complexity. By leveraging known relations between many well-studied graph parameters, we characterize the structural properties of input graphs that allow for polynomial kernels, fixed-parameter tractability (FPT), and slicewise polynomial algorithms (XP). Our main contribution is the near-complete establishment of the complexity of these algorithmic properties within the described hierarchy of graph parameters. On a technical level, our main results are fixed-parameter tractability for the (vertex-deletion) distance to cographs and an OR-cross composition excluding polynomial kernels for the vertex cover number of the input graph (under the standard complexity assumption NP is not contained in coNP/poly).
title The Parameterized Complexity Landscape of Two-Sets Cut-Uncut
topic Data Structures and Algorithms
Discrete Mathematics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.13543