Bounding the Weisfeiler-Leman Dimension via a Depth Analysis of I/R-Trees

TL;DR

This paper establishes new bounds on the Weisfeiler-Leman dimension, showing that counting quantifiers significantly reduce the number of variables needed to define graphs, and introduces the WL depth concept to analyze graph complexity.

Contribution

It introduces the WL depth concept and extends the I/R paradigm to derive bounds on the WL dimension for graphs with counting quantifiers.

Findings

Counting quantifiers reduce the WL dimension to about n/4 variables.

New bounds on the WL dimension in terms of vertex cover number.

Extension of the I/R paradigm with graph splitting techniques.

Abstract

The Weisfeiler-Leman (WL) dimension is an established measure for the inherent descriptive complexity of graphs and relational structures. It corresponds to the number of variables that are needed and sufficient to define the object of interest in a counting version of first-order logic (FO). These bounded-variable counting logics were even candidates to capture graph isomorphism, until a celebrated construction due to Cai, F\"urer, and Immerman [Combinatorica 1992] showed that $\Omega(n)$ variables are required to distinguish all non-isomorphic $n$-vertex graphs. Still, very little is known about the precise number of variables required and sufficient to define every $n$-vertex graph. For the bounded-variable (non-counting) FO fragments, Pikhurko, Veith, and Verbitsky [Discret. Appl. Math. 2006] provided an upper bound of $\frac{n+3}{2}$ and showed that it is essentially tight. Our main result yields that, in the presence of counting quantifiers, $\frac{n}{4} + o(n)$ variables suffice. This shows that counting does allow us to save variables when defining graphs. As an application of our techniques, we also show new bounds in terms of the vertex cover number of the graph. To obtain the results, we introduce a new concept called the WL depth of a graph. We use it to analyze branching trees within the Individualization/Refinement (I/R) paradigm from the domain of isomorphism algorithms. We extend the recursive procedure from the I/R paradigm by the possibility of splitting the graphs into independent parts. Then we bound the depth of the obtained branching trees, which translates into bounds on the WL dimension and thereby on the number of variables that suffice to define the graphs.