This comprehensive textbook on combinatorial optimization places special emphasis on theoretical results and algorithms with provably good performance, in contrast to heuristics. It is based on numerous courses on combinatorial optimization and specialized topics, mostly at graduate level. This book reviews the fundamentals, covers the classical topics (paths, flows, matching, matroids, NP-completeness, approximation algorithms) in detail, and proceeds to advanced and recent topics, some of which have not appeared in a textbook before. Throughout, it contains complete but concise proofs, and also provides numerous exercises and references. This sixth edition has again been updated, revised, and significantly extended. Among other additions, there are new sections on shallow-light trees, submodular function maximization, smoothed analysis of the knapsack problem, the (ln 4+ɛ)-approximation for Steiner trees, and the VPN theorem. Thus, this book continues to represent the state of the art of combinatorial optimization.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Combinatorial Optimization and Applications, COCOA 2010, held in Kailua-Kona, HI, USA, in December 2010. The 49 revised full papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 108 submissions.

This volume contains nine survey articles by the invited speakers of the 30th British Combinatorial Conference, held at Queen Mary University of London in July 2024. Each article provides an overview of recent developments in a current hot research topic in combinatorics. Topics covered include: Latin squares, Erdős covering systems, finite field models, sublinear expanders, cluster expansion, the slice rank polynomial method, and oriented trees and paths in digraphs. The authors are among the world's foremost researchers on their respective topics but their surveys are accessible to nonspecialist readers: they are written clearly with little prior knowledge assumed and with pointers to the wider literature. Taken together these surveys give a snapshot of the research frontier in contemporary combinatorics, helping researchers and graduate students in mathematics and theoretical computer science to keep abreast of the latest developments in the field.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 16th International Conference on Integer Programming and Combinatorial Optimization, IPCO 2013, held in Valparaíso, Chile, in March 2013. The 33 full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 98 submissions. The conference is a forum for researchers and practitioners working on various aspects of integer programming and combinatorial optimization with the aim to present recent developments in theory, computation, and applications. The scope of IPCO is viewed in a broad sense, to include algorithmic and structural results in integer programming and combinatorial optimization as well as revealing computational studies and novel applications of discrete optimization to practical problems.

RANDOM is concerned with applications of randomness to computational and combinatorial problems, and was the 13th workshop in the series following Bologna (1997), Barcelona (1998),Berkeley(1999),Geneva(2000),Berkeley(2001),Harvard(2002),Prin- ton (2003), Cambridge (2004), Berkeley (2005), Barcelona (2006), Princeton (2007), and Boston (2008).

Handbook of Approximation Algorithms and Metaheuristics, Second Edition reflects the tremendous growth in the field, over the past two decades. Through contributions from leading experts, this handbook provides a comprehensive introduction to the underlying theory and methodologies, as well as the various applications of approximation algorithms and metaheuristics. Volume 1 of this two-volume set deals primarily with methodologies and traditional applications. It includes restriction, relaxation, local ratio, approximation schemes, randomization, tabu search, evolutionary computation, local search, neural networks, and other metaheuristics. It also explores multi-objective optimization, reoptimization, sensitivity analysis, and stability. Traditional applications covered include: bin packing, multi-dimensional packing, Steiner trees, traveling salesperson, scheduling, and related problems. Volume 2 focuses on the contemporary and emerging applications of methodologies to problems in combinatorial optimization, computational geometry and graphs problems, as well as in large-scale and emerging application areas. It includes approximation algorithms and heuristics for clustering, networks (sensor and wireless), communication, bioinformatics search, streams, virtual communities, and more. About the Editor Teofilo F. Gonzalez is a professor emeritus of computer science at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He completed his Ph.D. in 1975 from the University of Minnesota. He taught at the University of Oklahoma, the Pennsylvania State University, and the University of Texas at Dallas, before joining the UCSB computer science faculty in 1984. He spent sabbatical leaves at the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education and Utrecht University. He is known for his highly cited pioneering research in the hardness of approximation; for his sublinear and best possible approximation algorithm for k-tMM clustering; for introducing the open-shop scheduling problem as well as algorithms for its solution that have found applications in numerous research areas; as well as for his research on problems in the areas of job scheduling, graph algorithms, computational geometry, message communication, wire routing, etc.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 20th Annual European Symposium on Algorithms, ESA 2012, held in Ljubljana, Slovenia, in September 2012 in the context of the combined conference ALGO 2012. The 69 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 285 initial submissions: 56 out of 231 in track design and analysis and 13 out of 54 in track engineering and applications. The papers are organized in topical sections such as algorithm engineering; algorithmic aspects of networks; algorithmic game theory; approximation algorithms; computational biology; computational finance; computational geometry; combinatorial optimization; data compression; data structures; databases and information retrieval; distributed and parallel computing; graph algorithms; hierarchical memories; heuristics and meta-heuristics; mathematical programming; mobile computing; on-line algorithms; parameterized complexity; pattern matching, quantum computing; randomized algorithms; scheduling and resource allocation problems; streaming algorithms.

This book deals with one of the most novel advances in mathematical modeling for applied scientific technology, including computer graphics, public-key encryption, data visualization, statistical data analysis, symbolic calculation, encryption, error correcting codes, and risk management. It also shows that mathematics can be used to solve problems from nature, e.g., slime mold algorithms. One of the unique features of this book is that it shows readers how to use pure and applied mathematics, especially those mathematical theory/techniques developed in the twentieth century, and developing now, to solve applied problems in several fields of industry. Each chapter includes clues on how to use "mathematics" to solve concrete problems faced in industry as well as practical applications. The target audience is not limited to researchers working in applied mathematics and includes those in engineering, material sciences, economics, and life sciences.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-proceedings of the 9th International Workshop on Approximation and Online Algorithms, WAOA 2011, held in Saarbrücken, Germany, in September 2011. The 21 papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 48 submissions. The volume also contains an extended abstract of the invited talk of Prof. Klaus Jansen. The Workshop on Approximation and Online Algorithms focuses on the design and analysis of algorithms for online and computationally hard problems. Both kinds of problems have a large number of applications in a wide variety of fields. Topics of interest for WAOA 2011 were: algorithmic game theory, approximation classes, coloring and partitioning, competitive analysis, computational finance, cuts and connectivity, geometric problems, inapproximability results, mechanism design, network design, packing and covering, paradigms for design and analysis of approximation and online algorithms, parameterized complexity, randomization techniques and scheduling problems.