License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0)
When quoting this document, please refer to the following
DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.FSTTCS.2022.29
URN: urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-174216
URL: http://dagstuhl.sunsite.rwth-aachen.de/volltexte/2022/17421/
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Ahmadi, Ali ; Chatterjee, Krishnendu ; Goharshady, Amir Kafshdar ; Meggendorfer, Tobias ; Safavi, Roodabeh ; Žikelić, Ðorđe

Algorithms and Hardness Results for Computing Cores of Markov Chains

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LIPIcs-FSTTCS-2022-29.pdf (0.8 MB)


Abstract

Given a Markov chain M = (V, v_0, δ), with state space V and a starting state v_0, and a probability threshold ε, an ε-core is a subset C of states that is left with probability at most ε. More formally, C ⊆ V is an ε-core, iff ℙ[reach (V\C)] ≤ ε. Cores have been applied in a wide variety of verification problems over Markov chains, Markov decision processes, and probabilistic programs, as a means of discarding uninteresting and low-probability parts of a probabilistic system and instead being able to focus on the states that are likely to be encountered in a real-world run. In this work, we focus on the problem of computing a minimal ε-core in a Markov chain. Our contributions include both negative and positive results: (i) We show that the decision problem on the existence of an ε-core of a given size is NP-complete. This solves an open problem posed in [Jan Kretínský and Tobias Meggendorfer, 2020]. We additionally show that the problem remains NP-complete even when limited to acyclic Markov chains with bounded maximal vertex degree; (ii) We provide a polynomial time algorithm for computing a minimal ε-core on Markov chains over control-flow graphs of structured programs. A straightforward combination of our algorithm with standard branch prediction techniques allows one to apply the idea of cores to find a subset of program lines that are left with low probability and then focus any desired static analysis on this core subset.

BibTeX - Entry

@InProceedings{ahmadi_et_al:LIPIcs.FSTTCS.2022.29,
  author =	{Ahmadi, Ali and Chatterjee, Krishnendu and Goharshady, Amir Kafshdar and Meggendorfer, Tobias and Safavi, Roodabeh and \v{Z}ikeli\'{c}, Ðor{\d}e},
  title =	{{Algorithms and Hardness Results for Computing Cores of Markov Chains}},
  booktitle =	{42nd IARCS Annual Conference on Foundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science (FSTTCS 2022)},
  pages =	{29:1--29:20},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-261-7},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2022},
  volume =	{250},
  editor =	{Dawar, Anuj and Guruswami, Venkatesan},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/opus/volltexte/2022/17421},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-174216},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.FSTTCS.2022.29},
  annote =	{Keywords: Markov Chains, Cores, Complexity}
}

Keywords: Markov Chains, Cores, Complexity
Collection: 42nd IARCS Annual Conference on Foundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science (FSTTCS 2022)
Issue Date: 2022
Date of publication: 14.12.2022


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