2-Layer Right Angle Crossing Drawings

A 2-layer drawing represents a bipartite graph where each vertex is a point on one of two parallel lines, no two vertices on the same line are adjacent, and the edges are straight-line segments. In this paper we study 2-layer drawings where any two crossing edges meet at right angle. We characterize the graphs that admit this type of drawing, provide linear-time testing and embedding algorithms, and present a polynomial-time crossing minimization technique. Also, for a given graph G and a constant k, we prove that it is $\mathcal{NP}$ -complete to decide whether G contains a subgraph of at least k edges having a 2-layer drawing with right angle crossings.     

Techniques for Edge Stratification of Complex Graph Drawings

We propose an approach that allows a user (e.g., an analyst) to explore a layout produced by any graph drawing algorithm, in order to reduce the visual complexity and clarify its presentation. Our approach is based on stratifying the drawing into layers with desired properties; to this aim, heuristics are presented. The produced layers can be explored and combined by the user to gradually acquire details. We present a user study to test the effectiveness of our approach. Furthermore, we performed an experimental analysis on popular force-directed graph drawing algorithms, in order to evaluate what is the algorithm that produces the smallest number of layers and if there is any correlation between the number of crossings and the number of layers of a graph layout. The proposed approach is useful to explore graph layouts, as confirmed by the presented user study. Furthermore, interesting considerations arise from the experimental evaluation, in particular, our results suggest that the number of layers of a graph layout may represent a reliable measure of its visual complexity. The algorithms presented in this paper can be effectively applied to graph layouts with a few hundreds of edges and vertices. For larger drawings that contain lots of crossings, the time complexity of our algorithms grows quadratically in the number of edges and more efficient techniques need to be devised. The proposed approach takes as input a layout produced by any graph drawing algorithm, therefore it can be applied in a variety of application domains. Several research directions can be explored to extend our framework and to devise new visualization paradigms to effectively present stratified drawings.     

A Fixed-Parameter Approach to 2-Layer Planarization

A bipartite graph is biplanar if the vertices can be placed on two parallel lines (layers) in the plane such that there are no edge crossings when edges are drawn as line segments between the layers. In this paper we study the 2-Layer Planarization problem: Can k edges be deleted from a given graph G so that the remaining graph is biplanar? This problem is NP-complete, and remains so if the permutation of the vertices in one layer is fixed (the 1-Layer Planarization problem). We prove that these problems are fixed-parameter tractable by giving linear-time algorithms for their solution (for fixed k). In particular, we solve the 2-Layer Planarization problem in O(k · 6^k + |G|) time and the 1-Layer Planarization problem in O(3^k · |G|) time. We also show that there are polynomial-time constant-approximation algorithms for both problems.     

Drawing graphs with right angle crossings

Cognitive experiments show that humans can read graph drawings in which all edge crossings are at right angles equally well as they can read planar drawings; they also show that the readability of a drawing is heavily affected by the number of bends along the edges. A graph visualization whose edges can only cross perpendicularly is called a RAC (Right Angle Crossing) drawing. This paper initiates the study of combinatorial and algorithmic questions related to the problem of computing RAC drawings with few bends per edge. Namely, we study the interplay between number of bends per edge and total number of edges in RAC drawings. We establish upper and lower bounds on these quantities by considering two classical graph drawing scenarios: The one where the algorithm can choose the combinatorial embedding of the input graph and the one where this embedding is fixed.     

Output-Sensitive Reporting of Disjoint Paths

A k -path query on a graph consists of computing k vertex-disjoint paths between two given vertices of the graph, whenever they exist. In this paper we study the problem of performing k -path queries, with , in a graph G with n vertices. We denote with the total length of the reported paths. For , we present an optimal data structure for G that uses O(n) space and executes k -path queries in output-sensitive time. For triconnected planar graphs, our results make use of a new combinatorial structure that plays the same role as bipolar (st ) orientations for biconnected planar graphs. This combinatorial structure also yields an alternative construction of convex grid drawings of triconnected planar graphs. Received August 24, 1996; revised April 8, 1997.     

Maximumk-covering of weighted transitive graphs with applications

Consider a weighted transitive graph, where each vertex is assigned a positive weight. Given a positive integerk, the maximumk-covering problem is to findk disjoint cliques covering a set of vertices with maximum total weight. An 0(kn ²)-time algorithm to solve the problem in a transitive graph is proposed, wheren is the number of vertices. Based on the proposed algorithm the weighted version of a number of problems in VLSI layout (e.g.,k-layer topological via minimization), computational geometry (e.g., maximum multidimensionalk-chain), graph theory (e.g., maximumk-independent set in interval graphs), and sequence manipulation (e.g., maximum increasingk-subsequence) can be solved inO(kn ²), wheren is the input size.This Work was supported in part by the National Science Foundation under Grant MIP-8709074 and MIP-8921540.     

Linear Time Algorithms for Finding a Dominating Set of Fixed Size in Degenerated Graphs

There is substantial literature dealing with fixed parameter algorithms for the dominating set problem on various families of graphs. In this paper, we give a k ^O(dk) n time algorithm for finding a dominating set of size at most k in a d-degenerated graph with n vertices. This proves that the dominating set problem is fixed-parameter tractable for degenerated graphs. For graphs that do not contain K _h as a topological minor, we give an improved algorithm for the problem with running time (O(h)) ^hk n. For graphs which are K _h -minor-free, the running time is further reduced to (O(log h)) ^hk/2 n. Fixed-parameter tractable algorithms that are linear in the number of vertices of the graph were previously known only for planar graphs. For the families of graphs discussed above, the problem of finding an induced cycle of a given length is also addressed. For every fixed H and k, we show that if an H-minor-free graph G with n vertices contains an induced cycle of size k, then such a cycle can be found in O(n) expected time as well as in O(nlog n) worst-case time. Some results are stated concerning the (im)possibility of establishing linear time algorithms for the more general family of degenerated graphs. A preliminary version of this paper appeared in the Proceedings of the 13th Annual International Computing and Combinatorics Conference (COCOON), Banff, Alberta, Canada (2007), pp. 394–405. N. Alon research supported in part by a grant from the Israel Science Foundation, and by the Hermann Minkowski Minerva Center for Geometry at Tel Aviv University. This paper forms part of a Ph.D. thesis written by S. Gutner under the supervision of Prof. N. Alon and Prof. Y. Azar in Tel Aviv University.     

Minimising the Number of Bends and Volume in 3-Dimensional Orthogonal Graph Drawings with a Diagonal Vertex Layout

A 3-dimensional orthogonal drawing of a graph with maximum degree at most 6, positions the vertices at grid-points in the 3-dimensional orthogonal grid, and routes edges along grid-lines such that edge routes only intersect at common end-vertices. Minimising the number of bends and the volume of 3-dimensional orthogonal drawings are established criteria for measuring the aesthetic quality of a given drawing. In this paper we present two algorithms for producing 3-dimensional orthogonal graph drawings with the vertices positioned along the main diagonal of a cube, so-called diagonal drawings. This vertex-layout strategy was introduced in the 3-BENDS algorithm of Eades et al. [Discrete Applied Math. 103:55–87, 2000]. We show that minimising the number of bends in a diagonal drawing of a given graph is NP-hard. Our first algorithm minimises the total number of bends for a fixed ordering of the vertices along the diagonal in linear time. Using two heuristics for determining this vertex-ordering we obtain upper bounds on the number of bends. Our second algorithm, which is a variation of the above-mentioned 3-BENDS algorithm, produces 3-bend drawings with n³+o(n³) volume, which is the best known upper bound for the volume of 3-dimensional orthogonal graph drawings with at most three bends per edge.     

Efficient Orthogonal Drawings of High Degree Graphs

Most of the work that appears in the two-dimensional orthogonal graph drawing literature deals with graphs whose maximum degree is four. In this paper we present an algorithm for orthogonal drawings of simple graphs with degree higher than four. Vertices are represented by rectangular boxes of perimeter less than twice the degree of the vertex. Our algorithm is based on creating groups / pairs of vertices of the graph. The orthogonal drawings produced by our algorithm have area at most (m-1) ( m / 2 +2) . Two important properties of our algorithm are that the drawings exhibit a small total number of bends (less than m ), and that there is at most one bend per edge. Received January 15, 1997; revised February 1, 1998.     

Why Almost All k-Colorable Graphs Are Easy to Color

Coloring a k-colorable graph using k colors (k≥3) is a notoriously hard problem. Considering average case analysis allows for better results. In this work we consider the uniform distribution over k-colorable graphs with n vertices and exactly cn edges, c greater than some sufficiently large constant. We rigorously show that all proper k-colorings of most such graphs lie in a single “cluster”, and agree on all but a small, though constant, portion of the vertices. We also describe a polynomial time algorithm that whp finds a proper k-coloring of such a random k-colorable graph, thus asserting that most such graphs are easy to color. This should be contrasted with the setting of very sparse random graphs (which are k-colorable whp), where experimental results show some regime of edge density to be difficult for many coloring heuristics.     

Non-contractible non-edges in 2-connected graphs

Any pair of non-adjacent vertices forms a non-edge in a graph. Contraction of a non-edge merges two non-adjacent vertices into a single vertex such that the edges incident on the non-adjacent vertices are now incident on the merged vertex. In this paper, we consider simple connected graphs, hence parallel edges are removed after contraction. The minimum number of nodes whose removal disconnects the graph is the connectivity of the graph. We say a graph is k-connected, if its connectivity is k. A non-edge in a k-connected graph is contractible if its contraction does not result in a graph of lower connectivity. Otherwise the non-edge is non-contractible. We focus our study on non-contractible non-edges in 2-connected graphs. We show that cycles are the only 2-connected graphs in which every non-edge is non-contractible.     

Property Testing on k-Vertex-Connectivity of?Graphs

We present an algorithm for testing the k-vertex-connectivity of graphs with the given maximum degree. The time complexity of the algorithm is independent of the number of vertices and edges of graphs. Fixed degree bound d, a graph G with n vertices and a maximum degree at most d is called ε-far from k-vertex-connectivity when at least $\frac{\epsilon dn}{2}$ edges must be added to or removed from G to obtain a k-vertex-connected graph with a maximum degree at most d. The algorithm always accepts every graph that is k-vertex-connected and rejects every graph that is ε-far from k-vertex-connectivity with a probability of at least 2/3. The algorithm runs in $O(d(\frac{c}{\epsilon d})^{k}\log\frac {1}{\epsilon d})$ time (c>1 is a constant) for (k?1)-vertex-connected graphs, and in $O(d(\frac{ck}{\epsilon d})^{k}\log\frac{k}{\epsilon d})$ time (c>1 is a constant) for general graphs. It is the first constant-time k-vertex-connectivity testing algorithm for general k≥4.     

Short Cycles Make W-hard Problems Hard: FPT Algorithms for W-hard Problems in Graphs with no Short Cycles

We show that several problems that are hard for various parameterized complexity classes on general graphs, become fixed parameter tractable on graphs with no small cycles. More specifically, we give fixed parameter tractable algorithms for Dominating Set, t -Vertex Cover (where we need to cover at least t edges) and several of their variants on graphs with girth at least five. These problems are known to be W[i]-hard for some i≥1 in general graphs. We also show that the Dominating Set problem is W[2]-hard for bipartite graphs and hence for triangle free graphs. In the case of Independent Set and several of its variants, we show these problems to be fixed parameter tractable even in triangle free graphs. In contrast, we show that the Dense Subgraph problem where one is interested in finding an induced subgraph on k vertices having at least l edges, parameterized by k, is W[1]-hard even on graphs with girth at least six. Finally, we give an O(log p) ratio approximation algorithm for the Dominating Set problem for graphs with girth at least 5, where p is the size of an optimum dominating set of the graph. This improves the previous O(log n) factor approximation algorithm for the problem, where n is the number of vertices of the input graph. A preliminary version of this paper appeared in the Proceedings of 10th Scandinavian Workshop on Algorithm Theory (SWAT), Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 4059, pp. 304–315, 2006.     

Larger crossing angles make graphs easier to read

Objective: Aesthetics are important in algorithm design and graph evaluation. This paper presents two user studies that were conducted to investigate the impact of crossing angles on human graph comprehension.Method and results: These two studies together demonstrate our newly proposed two-step approach for testing graph aesthetics. The first study is a controlled experiment with purposely-generated graphs. Twenty-two subjects participated in the study and were asked to determine the length of a path which was crossed by a set of parallel edges at different angles. The result of an analysis of variance showed that larger crossing angles induced better task performance. The second study was a non-controlled experiment with general real world graphs. Thirty-seven subjects participated in the study and were asked to find the shortest path of two pre-selected nodes in a set of graph drawings. The results of simple regression tests confirmed the negative effect of small crossing angles. This study also showed that among our four proposed candidates, the minimum crossing angle on the path was the best measure for the aesthetic when path finding is important.Conclusion: Larger crossing angles make graphs easier to read.Implications: In situations where crossings cannot be completely removed (for example, graphs are non-planar, or a drawing convention is applied), or where effort needed to remove all crossings cannot be justified, the crossing angle should be maximized to reduce the negative impact of crossings to the minimum.     

Improved approximation algorithms for MAXk-CUT and MAX BISECTION

Polynomial-time approximation algorithms with nontrivial performance guarantees are presented for the problems of (a) partitioning the vertices of a weighted graph intok blocks so as to maximize the weight of crossing edges, and (b) partitioning the vertices of a weighted graph into two blocks of equal cardinality, again so as to maximize the weight of crossing edges. The approach, pioneered by Goemans and Williamson, is via a semidefinite programming relaxation. The first author was supported in part by NSF Grant CCR-9225008. The work described here was undertaken while the second author was visiting Carnegie Mellon University; at that time he was a Nuffield Science Research Fellow, and was supported in part by Grant GR/F 90363 of the UK Science and Engineering Research Council, and Esprit Working Group 7097 “RAND”.     

A new force-directed graph drawing method based on edge–edge repulsion

The conventional force-directed methods for drawing undirected graphs are based on either vertex–vertex repulsion or vertex–edge repulsion. In this paper, we propose a new force-directed method based on edge–edge repulsion to draw graphs. In our framework, edges are modelled as charged springs, and a final drawing can be generated by adjusting positions of vertices according to spring forces and the repulsive forces, derived from potential fields, among edges. Different from the previous methods, our new framework has the advantage of overcoming the problem of zero angular resolution, guaranteeing the absence of any overlapping of edges incident to the common vertex. Given graph layouts probably generated by previous algorithms as the inputs to our algorithm, experimental results reveal that our approach produces promising drawings not only preserving the original properties of a high degree of symmetry and uniform edge length, but also preventing zero angular resolution and usually having larger average angular resolution. However, it should be noted that exhibiting a higher degree of symmetry and larger average angular resolution does not come without a price, as the new approach might result in the increase in undesirable overlapping of vertices as some of our experimental results indicate. To ease the problem of node overlapping, we also consider a hybrid approach which takes into account both edge–edge and vertex–vertex repulsive forces in drawing a graph.     

An Efficient Framework for Multiple Subgraph Pattern Matching Models

With the popularity of storing large data graph in cloud, the emergence of subgraph pattern matching on a remote cloud has been inspired. Typically, subgraph pattern matching is defined in terms of subgraph isomorphism, which is an NP-complete problem and sometimes too strict to find useful matches in certain applications. And how to protect the privacy of data graphs in subgraph pattern matching without undermining matching results is an important concern. Thus, we propose a novel framework to achieve the privacy-preserving subgraph pattern matching in cloud. In order to protect the structural privacy in data graphs, we firstly develop a k-automorphism model based method. Additionally, we use a cost-model based label generalization method to protect label privacy in both data graphs and pattern graphs. During the generation of the k-automorphic graph, a large number of noise edges or vertices might be introduced to the original data graph. Thus, we use the outsourced graph, which is only a subset of a k-automorphic graph, to answer the subgraph pattern matching. The efficiency of the pattern matching process can be greatly improved in this way. Extensive experiments on real-world datasets demonstrate the high efficiency of our framework.

     

A technique for drawing directed graphs

A four-pass algorithm for drawing directed graphs is presented. The fist pass finds an optimal rank assignment using a network simplex algorithm. The seconds pass sets the vertex order within ranks by an iterative heuristic, incorporating a novel weight function and local transpositions to reduce crossings. The third pass finds optimal coordinates for nodes by constructing and ranking an auxiliary graph. The fourth pass makes splines to draw edges. The algorithm creates good drawings and is fast