Snakes and Ladders: A Treewidth Story

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterAcademic

Abstract

Let G be an undirected graph. We say that G contains a ladder of length k if the (Formula presented) grid graph is an induced subgraph of G that is only connected to the rest of G via its four cornerpoints. We prove that if all the ladders contained in G are reduced to length 4, the treewidth remains unchanged (and that this bound is tight). Our result indicates that, when computing the treewidth of a graph, long ladders can simply be reduced, and that minimal forbidden minors for bounded treewidth graphs cannot contain long ladders. Our result also settles an open problem from algorithmic phylogenetics: the common chain reduction rule, used to simplify the comparison of two evolutionary trees, is treewidth-preserving in the display graph of the two trees.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationGraph-Theoretic Concepts in Computer Science
Subtitle of host publication49th International Workshop, WG 2023, Fribourg, Switzerland, June 28–30, 2023, Revised Selected Papers
PublisherSpringer, Cham
Pages187-200
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2023
Event49th International Workshop on Graph-Theoretic Concepts in Computer Science - University of Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland
Duration: 28 Jun 202330 Jun 2023
https://events.unifr.ch/wg2023/

Publication series

SeriesLecture Notes in Computer Science
Volume14093
ISSN0302-9743

Conference

Conference49th International Workshop on Graph-Theoretic Concepts in Computer Science
Abbreviated titleWG 2023
Country/TerritorySwitzerland
CityFribourg
Period28/06/2330/06/23
Internet address

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