We study small degree graph problems such as Maximum Independent Set
and Minimum Node Cover and improve approximation lower bounds for
them and for a number of related problems, like Max-B-Set Packing,
Min-B-Set Cover, Max-Matching in B-uniform 2-regular hypergraphs.
For example, we prove NP-hardness factor of 95/94
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Computing kernels for the hitting set problem (the problem of
finding a size-$k$ set that intersects each hyperedge of a
hypergraph) is a well-studied computational problem. For hypergraphs
with $m$ hyperedges, each of size at most~$d$, the best algorithms
can compute kernels of size $O(k^d)$ in ... more >>>