Colouring random graphs and maximising local diversity

Abstract

We study a variation of the graph colouring problem on random graphs of finite average connectivity. Given the number of colours, we aim to maximise the number of different colours at neighbouring vertices (i.e. one edge distance) of any vertex. Two efficient algorithms, belief propagation and Walksat are adapted to carry out this task. We present experimental results based on two types of random graphs for different system sizes and identify the critical value of the connectivity for the algorithms to find a perfect solution. The problem and the suggested algorithms have practical relevance since various applications, such as distributed storage, can be mapped onto this problem.