Optimal Reconstruction of Graphs under the Additive Model
Abstract
We study the problem of reconstructing unknown graphs under the additive combinatorial search model. The main result concerns the reconstruction of {\em bounded degree} \/graphs, i.e.\ graphs with the degree of all vertices bounded by a constant $d$. We show that such graphs can be reconstructed in $O(dn)$ non--adaptive queries, which matches the information--theoretic lower bound. The proof is based on the technique of se\-pa\-rating matrices. A central result here is a new upper bound for a general class of separating matrices. As a particular case, we obtain a tight upper bound for the class of $d$--separating matrices, which settles an open question stated by Lindström in~\cite{Lindstrom75}. Finally, we consider several particular classes of graphs. We show how an optimal non--adaptive solution of $O(n^2/\log n)$ queries for general graphs can be obtained. We also prove that trees with unbounded vertex degree can be reconstructed in a linear number of queries by a non--adaptive algorithm.