Almost-linear time parameterized algorithm for rankwidth via dynamic rankwidth

TL;DR

This paper introduces a nearly linear time algorithm for determining the rankwidth of a graph and constructing a rank decomposition, using a dynamic data structure that efficiently maintains these decompositions under graph updates.

Contribution

It presents a fully dynamic algorithm for maintaining rank decompositions of bounded width with subpolynomial update time, improving previous quadratic-time algorithms.

Findings

Achieves $O_k(n^{1+o(1)}) + O(m)$ time for rankwidth computation.

Provides a dynamic data structure with $O_k(2^{ oot{ig}{ ext{log n}} ext{ log log n}})$ amortized update time.

Extends dynamic algorithms to handle dense edge updates described by CMSO$_1$ sentences.

Abstract

We give an algorithm that given a graph $G$ with $n$ vertices and $m$ edges and an integer $k$, in time $O_k(n^{1+o(1)}) + O(m)$ either outputs a rank decomposition of $G$ of width at most $k$ or determines that the rankwidth of $G$ is larger than $k$; the $O_k(\cdot)$-notation hides factors depending on $k$. Our algorithm returns also a $(2^{k+1}-1)$-expression for cliquewidth, yielding a $(2^{k+1}-1)$-approximation algorithm for cliquewidth with the same running time. This improves upon the $O_k(n^2)$ time algorithm of Fomin and Korhonen [STOC 2022]. The main ingredient of our algorithm is a fully dynamic algorithm for maintaining rank decompositions of bounded width: We give a data structure that for a dynamic $n$-vertex graph $G$ that is updated by edge insertions and deletions maintains a rank decomposition of $G$ of width at most $4k$ under the promise that the rankwidth of $G$ never grows above $k$. The amortized running time of each update is $O_k(2^{\sqrt{\log n} \log \log n})$. The data structure furthermore can maintain whether $G$ satisfies some fixed ${\sf CMSO}_1$ property within the same running time. We also give a framework for performing ``dense'' edge updates inside a given set of vertices $X$, where the new edges inside $X$ are described by a given ${\sf CMSO}_1$ sentence and vertex labels, in amortized $O_k(|X| \cdot 2^{\sqrt{\log n} \log \log n})$ time. Our dynamic algorithm generalizes the dynamic treewidth algorithm of Korhonen, Majewski, Nadara, Pilipczuk, and Soko{\l}owski [FOCS 2023].