Syllabus (Tentative)

We will cover the following topics. All readings are from the book Approximation Algorithms by Vazirani
  1. Introduction, Types of Approximation Algorithms, Vertex Cover, Set Cover (Chapters 1,2)
  2. LP relaxations, Set Cover as an example of techniques (Chapters 12-15)
  3. Knapsack, Bin Packing, Makespan Scheduling (Chapters 8,9,10)
  4. Steiner Tree, TSP, Euclidean TSP (Chapters 3, 11)
  5. Max Sat, LP and Semidefinite relaxations (Chapters 16, 26)
  6. Scheduling Unrelated Parallel Machines, Scheduling to Minimize average completion time (Chapter 17 and handouts)
  7. Cuts (Chpaters 4, 18-21)
  8. Center and Facility location problems (Chapter 5, 24, 25)
  9. Hardness of Approximation (Chapter 29)
  10. Additional Topics
The goal of the course is to develop a familiarity with approximation algorithms and to study the techniques that allow for the development of approximation algorithms.