The Complexity Ecology of Parameters: An Illustration Using Bounded Max Leaf Number

In the framework of parameterized complexity, exploring how one parameter affects the complexity of a different parameterized (or unparameterized problem) is of general interest. A well-developed example is the investigation of how the parameter treewidth influences the complexity of (other) graph problems. The reason why such investigations are of general interest is that real-world input distributions for computational problems often inherit structure from the natural computational processes that produce the problem instances (not necessarily in obvious, or well-understood ways). The max leaf number ml(G) of a connected graph G is the maximum number of leaves in a spanning tree for G. Exploring questions analogous to the well-studied case of treewidth, we can ask: how hard is it to solve 3-Coloring, Hamilton Path, Minimum Dominating Set, Minimum Bandwidth or many other problems, for graphs of bounded max leaf number? What optimization problems are W[1]-hard under this parameteriza...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2007
• Where: CIE
• Authors: Michael R. Fellows, Frances A. Rosamond
• Keywords: CIE 2007, General Interest, Graph Problems, Max Leaf Number