With the advent of approximation algorithms for NP-hard combinatorial optimization problems, several techniques from exact optimization such as the primal-dual method have proven their staying power and versatility. This book describes a simple and powerful method that is iterative in essence, and similarly useful in a variety of settings for exact and approximate optimization. The authors highlight the commonality and uses of this method to prove a variety of classical polyhedral results on matchings, trees, matroids, and flows. The presentation style is elementary enough to be accessible to anyone with exposure to basic linear algebra and graph theory, making the book suitable for introductory courses in combinatorial optimization at the upper undergraduate and beginning graduate levels. Discussions of advanced applications illustrate their potential for future application in research in approximation algorithms.

With the advent of approximation algorithms for NP-hard combinatorial optimization problems, several techniques from exact optimization such as the primal-dual method have proven their staying power and versatility. This book describes a simple and powerful method that is iterative in essence, and similarly useful in a variety of settings for exact and approximate optimization. The authors highlight the commonality and uses of this method to prove a variety of classical polyhedral results on matchings, trees, matroids, and flows. The presentation style is elementary enough to be accessible to anyone with exposure to basic linear algebra and graph theory, making the book suitable for introductory courses in combinatorial optimization at the upper undergraduate and beginning graduate levels. Discussions of advanced applications illustrate their potential for future application in research in approximation algorithms.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Theory and Applications of Models of Computation, TAMC 2013, held in Hong Kong, China, in May 2013. The 31 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 70 submissions. Bringing together a wide range of researchers with interests in computational theory and applications, the papers address the three main themes of the conference which were computability, complexity, and algorithms and present current research in these fields with aspects to theoretical computer science, algorithmic mathematics, and applications to the physical sciences.