A roadmap for an algebraic set $V$ defined by polynomials with coefficients in some real field, say $\mathbb{R}$, is an algebraic curve contained in $V$ whose intersection with all connected components of $V\cap\mathbb{R}^{n}$ is connected. These objects, introduced by Canny, can be used to answer connectivity queries over $V\cap \mathbb{R}^{n}$ provided that they are required to contain the finite set of query points $\mathcal{P}\subset V$; in this case,we say that the roadmap is associated to $(V, \mathcal{P})$. In this paper, we make effective a connectivity result we previously proved, to design a Monte Carlo algorithm which, on input (i) a finite sequence of polynomials defining $V$ (and satisfying some regularity assumptions) and (ii) an algebraic representation of finitely many query points $\mathcal{P}$ in $V$, computes a roadmap for $(V, \mathcal{P})$. This algorithm generalizes the nearly optimal one introduced by the last two authors by dropping a boundedness assumption on the real trace of $V$. The output size and running times of our algorithm are both polynomial in $(nD)^{n\log d}$, where $D$ is the maximal degree of the input equations and $d$ is the dimension of $V$. As far as we know, the best previously known algorithm dealing with such sets has an output size and running time polynomial in $(nD)^{n\log^2 n}$.
As an important part of genetic algorithms (GAs), mutation operators is widely used in evolutionary algorithms to solve $\mathcal{NP}$-hard problems because it can increase the population diversity of individual. Due to limitations in mathematical tools, the mutation probability of the mutation operator is primarily empirically set in practical applications. In this paper, we propose a novel reduction method for the 0-1 knapsack problem(0-1 KP) and an improved mutation operator (IMO) based on the assumption $\mathcal{NP}\neq\mathcal{P}$, along with the utilization of linear relaxation techniques and a recent result by Dey et al. (Math. Prog., pp 569-587, 2022). We employ this method to calculate an upper bound of the mutation probability in general instances of the 0-1 KP, and construct an instance where the mutation probability does not tend towards 0 as the problem size increases. Finally, we prove that the probability of the IMO hitting the optimal solution within only a single iteration in large-scale instances is superior to that of the traditional mutation operator.
The merit factor of a $\{-1, 1\}$ binary sequence measures the collective smallness of its non-trivial aperiodic autocorrelations. Binary sequences with large merit factor are important in digital communications because they allow the efficient separation of signals from noise. It is a longstanding open question whether the maximum merit factor is asymptotically unbounded and, if so, what is its limiting value. Attempts to answer this question over almost sixty years have identified certain classes of binary sequences as particularly important: skew-symmetric sequences, symmetric sequences, and anti-symmetric sequences. Using only elementary methods, we find an exact formula for the mean and variance of the reciprocal merit factor of sequences in each of these classes, and in the class of all binary sequences. This provides a much deeper understanding of the distribution of the merit factor in these four classes than was previously available. A consequence is that, for each of the four classes, the merit factor of a sequence drawn uniformly at random from the class converges in probability to a constant as the sequence length increases.
We establish an invariance principle for polynomial functions of $n$ independent high-dimensional random vectors, and also show that the obtained rates are nearly optimal. Both the dimension of the vectors and the degree of the polynomial are permitted to grow with $n$. Specifically, we obtain a finite sample upper bound for the error of approximation by a polynomial of Gaussians, measured in Kolmogorov distance, and extend it to functions that are approximately polynomial in a mean squared error sense. We give a corresponding lower bound that shows the invariance principle holds up to polynomial degree $o(\log n)$. The proof is constructive and adapts an asymmetrisation argument due to V. V. Senatov. As applications, we obtain a higher-order delta method with possibly non-Gaussian limits, and generalise a number of known results on high-dimensional and infinite-order U-statistics, and on fluctuations of subgraph counts.
A walk $u_0u_1 \ldots u_{k-1}u_k$ is a \textit{weakly toll walk} if $u_0u_i \in E(G)$ implies $u_i = u_1$ and $u_ju_k\in E(G)$ implies $u_j=u_{k-1}$. A set $S$ of vertices of $G$ is {\it weakly toll convex} if for any two non-adjacent vertices $x,y \in S$ any vertex in a weakly toll walk between $x$ and $y$ is also in $S$. The {\em weakly toll convexity} is the graph convexity space defined over weakly toll convex sets. Many studies are devoted to determine if a graph equipped with a convexity space is a {\em convex geometry}. An \emph{extreme vertex} is an element $x$ of a convex set $S$ such that the set $S\backslash\{x\}$ is also convex. A graph convexity space is said to be a convex geometry if it satisfies the Minkowski-Krein-Milman property, which states that every convex set is the convex hull of its extreme vertices. It is known that chordal, Ptolemaic, weakly polarizable, and interval graphs can be characterized as convex geometries with respect to the monophonic, geodesic, $m^3$, and toll convexities, respectively. Other important classes of graphs can also be characterized in this way. In this paper, we prove that a graph is a convex geometry with respect to the weakly toll convexity if and only if it is a proper interval graph. Furthermore, some well-known graph invariants are studied with respect to the weakly toll convexity.
The logics $\mathsf{CS4}$ and $\mathsf{IS4}$ are the two leading intuitionistic variants of the modal logic $\mathsf{S4}$. Whether the finite model property holds for each of these logics have been long-standing open problems. It was recently shown that $\mathsf{IS4}$ has the finite frame property and thus the finite model property. In this paper, we prove that $\mathsf{CS4}$ also enjoys the finite frame property. Additionally, we investigate the following three logics closely related to $\mathsf{IS4}$. The logic $\mathsf{GS4}$ is obtained by adding the G\"odel--Dummett axiom to $\mathsf{IS4}$; it is both a superintuitionistic and a fuzzy logic and has previously been given a real-valued semantics. We provide an alternative birelational semantics and prove strong completeness with respect to this semantics. The extension $\mathsf{GS4^c}$ of $\mathsf{GS4}$ corresponds to requiring a crisp accessibility relation on the real-valued semantics. We give a birelational semantics corresponding to an extra confluence condition on the $\mathsf{GS4}$ birelational semantics and prove strong completeness. Neither of these two logics have the finite model property with respect to their real-valued semantics, but we prove that they have the finite frame property for their birelational semantics. Establishing the finite birelational frame property immediately establishes decidability, which was previously open for these two logics. Our proofs yield NEXPTIME upper bounds. The logic $\mathsf{S4I}$ is obtained from $\mathsf{IS4}$ by reversing the roles of the modal and intuitionistic relations in the birelational semantics. We also prove the finite frame property, and thereby decidability, for $\mathsf{S4I}$
We show that every $3$-connected $K_{2,\ell}$-minor free graph with minimum degree at least $4$ has maximum degree at most $7\ell$. As a consequence, we show that every 3-connected $K_{2,\ell}$-minor free graph with minimum degree at least $5$ and no twins of degree $5$ has bounded size. Our proofs use Steiner trees and nested cuts; in particular, they do not rely on Ding's characterization of $K_{2,\ell}$-minor free graphs.
We study empirical variants of the halfspace (Tukey) depth of a probability measure $\mu$, which are obtained by replacing $\mu$ with the corresponding weighted empirical measure. We prove analogues of the Marcinkiewicz--Zygmund strong law of large numbers and of the law of the iterated logarithm in terms of set inclusions and for the Hausdorff distance between the theoretical and empirical variants of depth trimmed regions. In the special case of $\mu$ being the uniform distribution on a convex body $K$, the depth trimmed regions are convex floating bodies of $K$, and we obtain strong limit theorems for their empirical estimators.
A monitoring edge-geodetic set, or simply an MEG-set, of a graph $G$ is a vertex subset $M \subseteq V(G)$ such that given any edge $e$ of $G$, $e$ lies on every shortest $u$-$v$ path of $G$, for some $u,v \in M$. The monitoring edge-geodetic number of $G$, denoted by $meg(G)$, is the minimum cardinality of such an MEG-set. This notion provides a graph theoretic model of the network monitoring problem. In this article, we compare $meg(G)$ with some other graph theoretic parameters stemming from the network monitoring problem and provide examples of graphs having prescribed values for each of these parameters. We also characterize graphs $G$ that have $V(G)$ as their minimum MEG-set, which settles an open problem due to Foucaud \textit{et al.} (CALDAM 2023), and prove that some classes of graphs fall within this characterization. We also provide a general upper bound for $meg(G)$ for sparse graphs in terms of their girth, and later refine the upper bound using the chromatic number of $G$. We examine the change in $meg(G)$ with respect to two fundamental graph operations: clique-sum and subdivisions. In both cases, we provide a lower and an upper bound of the possible amount of changes and provide (almost) tight examples.
We present a new algorithm for amortized inference in sparse probabilistic graphical models (PGMs), which we call $\Delta$-amortized inference ($\Delta$-AI). Our approach is based on the observation that when the sampling of variables in a PGM is seen as a sequence of actions taken by an agent, sparsity of the PGM enables local credit assignment in the agent's policy learning objective. This yields a local constraint that can be turned into a local loss in the style of generative flow networks (GFlowNets) that enables off-policy training but avoids the need to instantiate all the random variables for each parameter update, thus speeding up training considerably. The $\Delta$-AI objective matches the conditional distribution of a variable given its Markov blanket in a tractable learned sampler, which has the structure of a Bayesian network, with the same conditional distribution under the target PGM. As such, the trained sampler recovers marginals and conditional distributions of interest and enables inference of partial subsets of variables. We illustrate $\Delta$-AI's effectiveness for sampling from synthetic PGMs and training latent variable models with sparse factor structure.
Given an undirected graph $G$, a quasi-clique is a subgraph of $G$ whose density is at least $\gamma$ $(0 < \gamma \leq 1)$. Two optimization problems can be defined for quasi-cliques: the Maximum Quasi-Clique (MQC) Problem, which finds a quasi-clique with maximum vertex cardinality, and the Densest $k$-Subgraph (DKS) Problem, which finds the densest subgraph given a fixed cardinality constraint. Most existing approaches to solve both problems often disregard the requirement of connectedness, which may lead to solutions containing isolated components that are meaningless for many real-life applications. To address this issue, we propose two flow-based connectedness constraints to be integrated into known Mixed-Integer Linear Programming (MILP) formulations for either MQC or DKS problems. We compare the performance of MILP formulations enhanced with our connectedness constraints in terms of both running time and number of solved instances against existing approaches that ensure quasi-clique connectedness. Experimental results demonstrate that our constraints are quite competitive, making them valuable for practical applications requiring connectedness.