2006/04/06 by Manthey, Bodo
#Computational Complexity (cs.CC) #Data Structures and Algorithms (cs.DS) #Discrete Mathematics (cs.DM) #F.2.2 #FOS: Computer and information sciences #G.2.1 #G.2.2
paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.cs/0604020
A cycle cover of a graph is a set of cycles such that every vertex is part of exactly one cycle. An L-cycle cover is a cycle cover in which the length of every cycle is in the set L. The weight of a cycle cover of an edge-weighted graph is the sum of the weights of its edges. We come close to settling the complexity and approximability of computing L-cycle covers. On the one hand, we show that for almost all L, computing L-cycle covers of maximum weight in directed and undirected graphs is APX-hard and NP-hard. Most of our hardness results hold even if the edge weights are restricted to zero and one. On the other hand, we show that the problem of computing L-cycle covers of maximum weight can be approximated within a factor of 2 for undirected graphs and within a factor of 8/3 in the case of directed graphs. This holds for arbitrary sets L.