An undirected graph consists of a set of vertices and a set of undirected edges between vertices. Such a graph may contain an abundant number of cycles, then a feedback vertex set (FVS) is a set of vertices intersecting with each of these cycles. Constructing a FVS of cardinality approaching the global minimum value is a optimization problem in the nondeterministic polynomial-complete complexity class, therefore it might be extremely difficult for some large graph instances. In this paper we develop a simulated annealing local search algorithm for the undirected FVS problem. By defining an order for the vertices outside the FVS, we replace the global cycle constraints by a set of local vertex constraints on this order. Under these local constraints the cardinality of the focal FVS is then gradually reduced by the simulated annealing dynamical process. We test this heuristic algorithm on large instances of Erödos-Renyi random graph and regular random graph, and find that this algorithm is comparable in performance to the belief propagation-guided decimation algorithm.
In 2014, Qin and Zhou REF proposed the Simulated Annealing Local Searching Protocol for the Undirected FVSP (SALS) based on the work of Galinier et al.. This algorithm is only applicable to the undirected graph version of the FVSP.
Solving the undirected feedback vertex set problem by local search
The European Physical Journal B
Physics Computer Science