Syllabus (Tentative)
We will cover the following topics. All readings are from the book
Approximation Algorithms by Vazirani
- Introduction, Types of Approximation Algorithms, Vertex Cover,
Set Cover (Chapters 1,2)
- LP relaxations, Set Cover as an example of techniques (Chapters
12-15)
- Knapsack, Bin Packing, Makespan Scheduling (Chapters 8,9,10)
- Steiner Tree, TSP, Euclidean TSP (Chapters 3, 11)
- Max Sat, LP and Semidefinite relaxations (Chapters 16, 26)
- Scheduling Unrelated Parallel Machines, Scheduling to Minimize
average completion time (Chapter 17 and handouts)
- Cuts (Chpaters 4, 18-21)
- Center and Facility location problems (Chapter 5, 24, 25)
- Hardness of Approximation (Chapter 29)
- 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.