Propositional proof complexity deals with the lengths of polynomial-time verifiable proofs for Boolean tautologies. An abundance of proof systems is known, including algebraic and semialgebraic systems, which work with polynomial equations and inequalities, respectively. The most basic algebraic proof system is based on Hilbert's Nullstellensatz (Beame et al., 1996). Tropical ... more >>>

Hitting formulas have been studied in many different contexts at least since [Iwama 1989]. A hitting formula is a set of Boolean clauses such that any two of the clauses cannot be simultaneously falsified. [Peitl and Szeider 2022] conjectured that the family of unsatisfiable hitting formulas should contain the hardest ... more >>>

The (extended) Binary Value Principle (eBVP, the equation $\sum x_i 2^{i-1} = -k$ for $k > 0$
and in the presence of $x_i^2=x_i$) has received a lot of attention recently, several lower
bounds have been proved for it [Alekseev et al 20, Alekseev 21, Part and Tzameret 21].
Also ... more >>>

We introduce the `binary value principle' which is a simple subset-sum instance expressing that a natural number written in binary cannot be negative, relating it to central problems in proof and algebraic complexity. We prove conditional superpolynomial lower bounds on the Ideal Proof System (IPS) refutation size of this instance, ... more >>>

Although a simple counting argument shows the existence of Boolean functions of exponential circuit complexity, proving superlinear circuit lower bounds for explicit functions seems to be out of reach of the current techniques. There has been a (very slow) progress in proving linear lower bounds with the latest record of ... more >>>

We consider Boolean circuits over the full binary basis. We prove a $(3+\frac{1}{86})n-o(n)$ lower bound on the size of such a circuit for an explicitly defined predicate, namely an affine disperser for sublinear dimension. This improves the $3n-o(n)$ bound of Norbert Blum (1984). The proof is based on the gate ... more >>>

Unambiguous hierarchies [NR93,LR94,NR98] are defined similarly to the polynomial hierarchy; however, all witnesses must be unique. These hierarchies have subtle differences in the mode of using oracles. We consider a "loose" unambiguous hierarchy $prUH_\bullet$ with relaxed definition of oracle access to promise problems. Namely, we allow to make queries that ... more >>>

The existence of optimal algorithms is not known for any decision problem in NP$\setminus$P. We consider the problem of testing the membership in the image of an injective function. We construct optimal heuristic algorithms for this problem in both randomized and deterministic settings (a heuristic algorithm can err on a ... more >>>

The existence of an optimal propositional proof system is a major open question in proof complexity; many people conjecture that such systems do not exist. Krajicek and Pudlak (1989) show that this question is equivalent to the existence of an algorithm that is optimal on all propositional tautologies. Monroe (2009) ... more >>>

We assume the existence of a function f that is computable in polynomial time but its inverse function is not computable in randomized average-case polynomial time. The cryptographic setting is, however, different: even for a weak one-way function, every possible adversary should fail on a polynomial fraction of inputs. Nevertheless, ... more >>>

We present a cryptosystem which is complete for the class of probabilistic public-key cryptosystems with bounded error. Besides traditional encryption schemes such as RSA and El Gamal, this class contains probabilistic encryption of Goldwasser-Micali as well as Ajtai-Dwork and NTRU cryptosystems. The latter two are known to make errors with ... more >>>

We give a deterministic algorithm for testing satisfiability of formulas in conjunctive normal form with no restriction on clause length. Its upper bound on the worst-case running time matches the best known upper bound for randomized satisfiability-testing algorithms [Dantsin and Wolpert, SAT 2005]. In comparison with the randomized algorithm in ... more >>>

We prove a time hierarchy theorem for inverting functions
computable in polynomial time with one bit of advice.
In particular, we prove that if there is a strongly
one-way function, then for any k and for any polynomial p,
there is a function f computable in linear time
with one ... more >>>

Goerdt (1991) considered a weakened version of the Cutting Plane proof system with a restriction on the degree of falsity of intermediate inequalities. (The degree of falsity of an inequality written in the form $\sum a_ix_i+\sum b_i(1-x_i)\ge c,\ a_i,b_i\ge0$ is its constant term $c$.) He proved a superpolynomial lower bound ... more >>>

DPLL (for Davis, Putnam, Logemann, and Loveland) algorithms form the largest family of contemporary algorithms for SAT (the propositional satisfiability problem) and are widely used in applications. The recursion trees of DPLL algorithm executions on unsatisfiable formulas are equivalent to tree-like resolution proofs. Therefore, lower bounds for tree-like resolution (which ... more >>>

We present a simple randomized algorithm for SAT and prove an upper
bound on its running time. Given a Boolean formula F in conjunctive
normal form, the algorithm finds a satisfying assignment for F
(if any) by repeating the following: Choose an assignment A at
random and ... more >>>

We prove that the Cutting Plane proof system based on
Gomory-Chvatal cuts polynomially simulates the
lift-and-project system with integer coefficients
written in unary. The restriction on coefficients can be
omitted when using Krajicek's cut-free Gentzen-style extension
of both systems. We also prove that Tseitin tautologies
have short proofs in ... more >>>

It is a known approach to translate propositional formulas into
systems of polynomial inequalities and to consider proof systems
for the latter ones. The well-studied proof systems of this kind
are the Cutting Planes proof system (CP) utilizing linear
inequalities and the Lovasz-Schrijver calculi (LS) utilizing
quadratic ... more >>>

We survey recent algorithms for the propositional
satisfiability problem, in particular algorithms
that have the best current worst-case upper bounds
on their complexity. We also discuss some related
issues: the derandomization of the algorithm of
Paturi, Pudlak, Saks and Zane, the Valiant-Vazirani
Lemma, and random walk ... more >>>

We introduce two algebraic propositional proof systems F-NS
and F-PC. The main difference of our systems from (customary)
Nullstellensatz and Polynomial Calculus is that the polynomials
are represented as arbitrary formulas (rather than sums of
monomials). Short proofs of Tseitin's tautologies in the
constant-depth version of F-NS provide ... more >>>

The maximum 2-satisfiability problem (MAX-2-SAT) is:
given a Boolean formula in $2$-CNF, find a truth
assignment that satisfies the maximum possible number
of its clauses. MAX-2-SAT is MAXSNP-complete.
Recently, this problem received much attention in the
contexts of approximation (polynomial-time) algorithms
... more >>>

During the past three years there was an explosion of algorithms
solving MAX-SAT and MAX-2-SAT in worst-case time of the order
c^K, where c<2 is a constant, and K is the number of clauses
in the input formula. Such bounds w.r.t. the number of variables
instead of the number of ... more >>>

Recently there was a significant progress in
proving (exponential-time) worst-case upper bounds for the
propositional satisfiability problem (SAT).
MAX-SAT is an important generalization of SAT.
Several upper bounds were obtained for MAX-SAT and
its NP-complete subproblems.
In particular, Niedermeier and Rossmanith recently
... more >>>