Steiner Forest Orientation Problems

TL;DR

This paper studies orientation problems in graphs, providing approximation algorithms, fixed-parameter tractability results, and polynomial-time solutions for specific connectivity problems, advancing understanding of directed and mixed graph orientation challenges.

Contribution

It introduces a 4-approximation algorithm for Steiner Forest Orientation and establishes fixed-parameter tractability for maximum pairs orientation in undirected graphs, among other results.

Findings

4-approximation algorithm for Steiner Forest Orientation

Fixed-parameter tractability for maximum pairs orientation in undirected graphs

Polynomial-time solution for a node-connectivity problem with specified disjoint paths

Abstract

We consider connectivity problems with orientation constraints. Given a directed graph $D$ and a collection of ordered node pairs $P$ let $P[D]=\{(u,v) \in P: D {contains a} uv{-path}}$. In the {\sf Steiner Forest Orientation} problem we are given an undirected graph $G=(V,E)$ with edge-costs and a set $P \subseteq V \times V$ of ordered node pairs. The goal is to find a minimum-cost subgraph $H$ of $G$ and an orientation $D$ of $H$ such that $P[D]=P$. We give a 4-approximation algorithm for this problem. In the {\sf Maximum Pairs Orientation} problem we are given a graph $G$ and a multi-collection of ordered node pairs $P$ on $V$. The goal is to find an orientation $D$ of $G$ such that $|P[D]|$ is maximum. Generalizing the result of Arkin and Hassin [DAM'02] for $|P|=2$, we will show that for a mixed graph $G$ (that may have both directed and undirected edges), one can decide in $n^{O(|P|)}$ time whether $G$ has an orientation $D$ with $P[D]=P$ (for undirected graphs this problem admits a polynomial time algorithm for any $P$, but it is NP-complete on mixed graphs). For undirected graphs, we will show that one can decide whether $G$ admits an orientation $D$ with $|P[D]| \geq k$ in $O(n+m)+2^{O(k\cdot \log \log k)}$ time; hence this decision problem is fixed-parameter tractable, which answers an open question from Dorn et al. [AMB'11]. We also show that {\sf Maximum Pairs Orientation} admits ratio $O(\log |P|/\log\log |P|)$, which is better than the ratio $O(\log n/\log\log n)$ of Gamzu et al. [WABI'10] when $|P|<n$. Finally, we show that the following node-connectivity problem can be solved in polynomial time: given a graph $G=(V,E)$ with edge-costs, $s,t \in V$, and an integer $\ell$, find a min-cost subgraph $H$ of $G$ with an orientation $D$ such that $D$ contains $\ell$ internally-disjoint $st$-paths, and $\ell$ internally-disjoint $ts$-paths.