Model checking with temporal graphs and their derivative

TL;DR

This paper extends Courcelle's Theorem to temporal graphs, introducing derivatives and new width measures to efficiently solve complex temporal graph problems expressed in monadic second-order logic.

Contribution

It presents the first adaptation of Courcelle's Theorem for temporal graphs that does not depend on lifetime-related parameters, using derivatives and width measures.

Findings

First adaptation of Courcelle's Theorem for temporal graphs

Introduces derivatives and width measures for temporal graphs

Enables solving a wide range of temporal graph problems

Abstract

Temporal graphs are graphs where the presence or properties of their vertices and edges change over time. When time is discrete, a temporal graph can be defined as a sequence of static graphs over a discrete time span, called lifetime, or as a single graph where each edge is associated with a specific set of time instants where the edge is alive. For static graphs, Courcelle's Theorem asserts that any graph problem expressible in monadic second-order logic can be solved in linear time on graphs of bounded tree-width. We propose the first adaptation of Courcelle's Theorem for monadic second-order logic on temporal graphs that does not explicitly rely on a parameter proportional to the lifetime, or defined as the maximum number of time-edges incident with any vertex which in the worst case is higher than the lifetime. We then introduce the notion of derivative over a sliding time window of a chosen size, and define the tree-width and twin-width of the temporal graph's derivative. We exemplify its usefulness with meta-theorems with respect to a temporal variant of first-order logic. The resulting logic expresses a wide range of temporal graph problems including a version of temporal cliques, an important notion when querying time series databases for community structures.