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Minimum k-way cuts via deterministic greedy tree packing

Published: 17 May 2008 Publication History

Abstract

We present a simple and fast deterministic algorithm for the minimum k-way cut problem in a capacitated graph, that is, finding a set of edges with minimum total capacity whose removal splits the graph into at least k components. The algorithm packs O(mk3 log n) trees. Each new tree is a minimal spanning tree with respect to the edge utilizations, and the utilization of an edge is the number of times it has been used in previous spanning trees divided by its capacity. We prove that each minimum k-way cut is crossed at most 2k-2 times by one of the trees. We can enumerate all such cuts in ~O(n2k) time, which is hence the running time of our algorithm producing all minimum k-way cuts. The previous fastest deterministic algorithm of Kamidoi et al. [SICOMP'06] took O(n(4+o(1))k) time, so this is a near-quadratic improvement. Moreover, we essentially match the O(n(2-o(1))k) running time of the Monto Carlo (no correctness guarantee) randomized algorithm of Karger and Stein [JACM'96].

References

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O. Goldschmidt and D. S. Hochbaum. A polynomial algorithm for the k-cut problem for fixed k. Math. Oper. Res., 19(1):24--37, 1994. Announced at FOCS’88.
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J. Holm, K. Lichtenberg, and M. Thorup. Poly-logarithmic deterministic fully-dynamic algorithms for connectivity, minimum spanning tree, 2-edge and biconnectivity. J. ACM, 48(4):723--760, 2001. Announced at STOC’98.
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Y. Kamidoi, N. Yoshida, and H. Nagamochi. A deterministic algorithm for finding all minimum k-way cuts. SIAM J. Computing, 36(5):1329--1341, 2006.
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D. R. Karger. Minimum cuts in near-linear time. J. ACM, 47(1):46--76, 2000.
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D. R. Karger and C. Stein. A new approach to the minimum cut problem. J. ACM, 43(4), 1996.
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H. Nagamochi, S. Katayama, and T. Ibaraki. Faster algorithm for computing minimum 5-way and 6-way cuts. J. Combinatorial Optimization, 4:151--169, 2000.
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J. Naor and Y. Rabani. Tree packing and approximating k-cuts. In Proc. 12th SODA, pages 26--27, 2001.
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C. S. J. A. Nash-Williams. Edge disjoint spanning trees of finite graphs. J. London Math. Soc., 36(144):445--450, 1961.
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S. A. Plotkin, D. B. Shmoys, and É. Tardos. Fast approximation algorithms for fractional packing and covering problems. Math. Oper. Res., 20:257--301, 1995.
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M. Thorup. Fully-dynamic min-cut. Combinatorica, 27(1):91--127, 2007. Announced at STOC’01.
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  • (2024)Partitioning subclasses of chordal graphs with few deletionsTheoretical Computer Science10.1016/j.tcs.2023.114288983(114288)Online publication date: Feb-2024
  • (2024)A polynomial time algorithm for finding a minimum 4-partition of a submodular functionMathematical Programming: Series A and B10.1007/s10107-023-02029-0207:1-2(717-732)Online publication date: 1-Sep-2024
  • (2023)Minimum Cut and Minimum k-Cut in Hypergraphs via Branching ContractionsACM Transactions on Algorithms10.1145/357016219:2(1-22)Online publication date: 15-Apr-2023
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cover image ACM Conferences
STOC '08: Proceedings of the fortieth annual ACM symposium on Theory of computing
May 2008
712 pages
ISBN:9781605580470
DOI:10.1145/1374376
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Publication History

Published: 17 May 2008

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  1. k-way cuts
  2. tree packing

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STOC '08
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STOC '08: Symposium on Theory of Computing
May 17 - 20, 2008
British Columbia, Victoria, Canada

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STOC '08 Paper Acceptance Rate 80 of 325 submissions, 25%;
Overall Acceptance Rate 1,469 of 4,586 submissions, 32%

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Cited By

View all
  • (2024)Partitioning subclasses of chordal graphs with few deletionsTheoretical Computer Science10.1016/j.tcs.2023.114288983(114288)Online publication date: Feb-2024
  • (2024)A polynomial time algorithm for finding a minimum 4-partition of a submodular functionMathematical Programming: Series A and B10.1007/s10107-023-02029-0207:1-2(717-732)Online publication date: 1-Sep-2024
  • (2023)Minimum Cut and Minimum k-Cut in Hypergraphs via Branching ContractionsACM Transactions on Algorithms10.1145/357016219:2(1-22)Online publication date: 15-Apr-2023
  • (2023)Deterministic enumeration of all minimum cut-sets and k-cut-sets in hypergraphs for fixed kMathematical Programming10.1007/s10107-023-02013-8207:1-2(329-367)Online publication date: 12-Sep-2023
  • (2023)Min–Max Partitioning of Hypergraphs and Symmetric Submodular FunctionsCombinatorica10.1007/s00493-023-00021-y43:3(455-477)Online publication date: 27-Apr-2023
  • (2023)Packing Hypertrees and the k-cut Problem in HypergraphsLearning and Intelligent Optimization10.1007/978-3-031-24866-5_37(521-534)Online publication date: 5-Feb-2023
  • (2022)Breaking the n barrier for minimum k-cut on simple graphsProceedings of the 54th Annual ACM SIGACT Symposium on Theory of Computing10.1145/3519935.3519948(131-136)Online publication date: 9-Jun-2022
  • (2022)Fixed parameter approximation scheme for min-max k-cutMathematical Programming10.1007/s10107-022-01842-3197:2(1093-1144)Online publication date: 16-Jun-2022
  • (2021)Min-max partitioning of hypergraphs and symmetric submodular functionsProceedings of the Thirty-Second Annual ACM-SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms10.5555/3458064.3458128(1026-1038)Online publication date: 10-Jan-2021
  • (2021)Optimal Bounds for the k-cut ProblemJournal of the ACM10.1145/347801869:1(1-18)Online publication date: 29-Nov-2021
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