Uniform random spanning trees

In this paper, we set forth a new algorithm for generating approximately uniformly random spanning trees in undirected graphs. We show how to sample from a distribution that is within a multiplicative $(1+\delta)$ of uniform in expected time $\TO(m\sqrt{n}\log 1/\delta)$. This improves the sparse graph case of the best previously known worst-case bound of $O(\min \{mn, n^{2.376}\})$, which has stood for twenty years. To achieve this goal, we exploit the connection between r...

We give an $m^{1+o(1)}\beta^{o(1)}$-time algorithm for generating a uniformly random spanning tree in an undirected, weighted graph with max-to-min weight ratio $\beta$. We also give an $m^{1+o(1)}\epsilon^{-o(1)}$-time algorithm for generating a random spanning tree with total variation distance $\epsilon$ from the true uniform distribution. Our second algorithm's runtime does not depend on the edge weights. Our $m^{1+o(1)}\beta^{o(1)}$-time algorithm is the first almost-lin...

We study the height of a spanning tree $T$ of a graph $G$ obtained by starting with a single vertex of $G$ and repeatedly selecting, uniformly at random, an edge of $G$ with exactly one endpoint in $T$ and adding this edge to $T$.

We consider the problem of uniformly generating a spanning tree, of a connected undirected graph. This process is useful to compute statistics, namely for phylogenetic trees. We describe a Markov chain for producing these trees. For cycle graphs we prove that this approach significantly outperforms existing algorithms. For general graphs we obtain no analytical bounds, but experimental results show that the chain still converges quickly. This yields an efficient algorithm, al...

We present an explicit connected spanning structure that appears in a random graph just above the connectivity threshold with high probability.

Consider a connected graph $G=(E,V)$ with $N=|V|$ vertices. The main purpose of this paper is to explore the question of uniform sampling of a subtree of $G$ with $n$ nodes, for some $n\leq N$ (the spanning tree case correspond to $n=N$, and is already deeply studied in the literature). We provide new asymptotically exact simulation methods using Markov chains for general connected graphs $G$, and any $n\leq N$. We highlight the case of the uniform subtree of $\mathbb{Z}^2$ w...

Assume that the edges of the complete graph $K_n$ are given independent uniform $[0,1]$ edges weights. We consider the expected minimum total weight $\mu_k$ of $k\geq 2$ edge disjoint spanning trees. When $k$ is large we show that $\mu_k\approx k^2$. Most of the paper is concerned with the case $k=2$. We show that $\m_2$ tends to an explicitly defined constant and that $\mu_2\approx 4.1704288\ldots$.

In the present paper we establish a clear correspondence between probabilities of certain edges belonging to a realization of the uniform spanning tree (UST), and the states of a fermionic Gaussian free field. Namely, we express the probabilities of given edges belonging or not to the UST in terms of fermionic Gaussian expectations. This allows us to explicitly calculate joint probability mass functions of the degree of the UST on a general finite graph, as well as obtain the...

Let $d \geq 3$ be a fixed integer. We give an asympotic formula for the expected number of spanning trees in a uniformly random $d$-regular graph with $n$ vertices. (The asymptotics are as $n\to\infty$, restricted to even $n$ if $d$ is odd.) We also obtain the asymptotic distribution of the number of spanning trees in a uniformly random cubic graph, and conjecture that the corresponding result holds for arbitrary (fixed) $d$. Numerical evidence is presented which supports our...

We study the asymptotic behavior of four statistics associated with subtrees of complete graphs: the uniform probability $p_n$ that a random subtree is a spanning tree of $K_n$, the weighted probability $q_n$ (where the probability a subtree is chosen is proportional to the number of edges in the subtree) that a random subtree spans and the two expectations associated with these two probabilities. We find $p_n$ and $q_n$ both approach $e^{-e^{-1}}\approx .692$, while both exp...