Long Cycles in Graphs: Extremal Combinatorics Meets Parameterized Algorithms

Abstract

We discuss recent algorithmic extensions of two classic results of extremal combinatorics about long paths in graphs. First, the theorem of Dirac from 1952 asserts that a 2-connected graph G with the minimum vertex degree d > 1, is either Hamiltonian or contains a cycle of length at least 2d. Second, the theorem of Erdős-Gallai from 1959, states that a graph G with the average vertex degree D > 1, contains a cycle of length at least D. The proofs of these theorems are constructive, they provide polynomial-time algorithms constructing cycles of lengths 2d and D. We extend these algorithmic results by showing that each of the problems, to decide whether a 2-connected graph contains a cycle of length at least 2d+k or of a cycle of length at least D+k, is fixed-parameter tractable parameterized by k.