Fixed-parameter tractable generalizations of cluster editing

Paper in proceedings, 2006

In the Cluster Editing problem, a graph has to be changed to a disjoint union of cliques by at most k edge insertions or deletions. Several reasons suggest a generalized problem where the target graph can have some overlapping cliques. We show that the problem remains fixed-parameter tractable (FPT) in the combination of both parameters: k and a second parameter t describing somehow the complexity of overlap structure. For this result we need a structural property of twins in graphs enabling a certain elimination scheme that finally leads to a small enough subgraph we can branch on. We also give a nontrivial algorithm for the problem of minimizing the number of disjoint clusters, based on a concise enumeration of all solutions to the original Cluster Editing problem. This generic scheme may become interesting also for other multicriteria FPT problems.