This paper concerns the open problem of Lovasz and
Saks regarding the relationship between the communication complexity
of a boolean function and the rank of the associated matrix.
We first give an example exhibiting the largest gap known. We then
prove two related theorems.

We prove an unexpected upper bound on a communication game proposed
by Jeff Edmonds and Russell Impagliazzo as an approach for
proving lower bounds for time-space tradeoffs for branching programs.
Our result is based on a generalization of a construction of Erdos,
Frankl and Rodl of a large 3-hypergraph with ... more >>>

We develop an analytic framework based on
linear approximation and point out how a number of complexity
related questions --
on circuit and communication
complexity lower bounds, as well as
pseudorandomness, learnability, and general combinatorics
of Boolean functions --
fit neatly into this framework. This ... more >>>

--
Scalar product estimates have so far been used in
proving several unweighted threshold lower bounds.
We show that if a basis set of Boolean functions satisfies
certain weak stability conditions, then
scalar product estimates
yield lower bounds for the size of weighted thresholds
of these basis functions.
Stable ... more >>>

Tiwari (1987) considered the following scenario: k+1 processors P_0,...,P_k,
connected by k links to form a linear array, compute a function f(x,y), for
inputs (x,y) from a finite domain X x Y, where x is only known to P_0 and
y is only known to P_k; the intermediate ... more >>>

We introduce a notion of a "real game"
(a generalization of the Karchmer - Wigderson game),
and "real communication complexity",
and relate them to the size of monotone real formulas
and circuits. We give an exponential lower bound
for tree-like monotone protocols of small real
communication complexity solving ... more >>>

The study of the computational power of randomized
computations is one of the central tasks of complexity theory. The
main goal of this paper is the comparison of the power of Las Vegas
computation and deterministic respectively nondeterministic
computation. We investigate the power of Las Vegas computation for the
more >>>

Using a notion of real communication complexity recently
introduced by J. Krajicek, we prove a lower bound on the depth of
monotone real circuits and the size of monotone real formulas for
st-connectivity. This implies a super-polynomial speed-up of dag-like
over tree-like Cutting Planes proofs.

We extend the tools for proving lower bounds for randomized branching
programs by presenting a new technique for the read-once case which is
applicable to a large class of functions. This technique fills the gap
between simple methods only applicable for OBDDs and the well-known
"rectangle technique" of Borodin, Razborov ... more >>>

We obtain improved lower bounds for a class of static and dynamic
data structure problems that includes several problems of searching
sorted lists as special cases.

These lower bounds nearly match the upper bounds given by recent
striking improvements in searching algorithms given by Fredman and
Willard's fusion ... more >>>

The superposition (or composition) problem is a problem of
representation of a function $f$ by a superposition of "simpler" (in a
different meanings) set $\Omega$ of functions. In terms of circuits
theory this means a possibility of computing $f$ by a finite circuit
with 1 fan-out gates $\Omega$ of functions.

A regular $(1,+k)$-branching program ($(1,+k)$-ReBP) is an
ordinary branching program with the following restrictions: (i)
along every consistent path at most $k$ variables are tested more
than once, (ii) for each node $v$ on all paths from the source to
$v$ the same set $X(v)\subseteq X$ of variables is tested, ... more >>>

One of the great challenges of complexity theory is the problem of
analyzing the dependence of the complexity of Boolean functions on the
resources nondeterminism and randomness. So far, this problem could be
solved only for very few models of computation. For so-called
partitioned binary decision diagrams, which are a ... more >>>

This paper deals with the number of monochromatic combinatorial
rectangles required to approximate a Boolean function on a constant
fraction of all inputs, where each rectangle may be defined with
respect to its own partition of the input variables. The main result
of the paper is that the number of ... more >>>

While deterministic finite automata seem to be well understood, surprisingly
many important problems
concerning nondeterministic finite automata (nfa's) remain open.

One such problem area is the study of different measures of nondeterminism in
finite automata and the
estimation of the sizes of minimal nondeterministic finite automata. In this
paper the ... more >>>

A fundamental question of complexity theory is the direct product
question. Namely weather the assumption that a function $f$ is hard on
average for some computational class (meaning that every algorithm from
the class has small advantage over random guessing when computing $f$)
entails that computing $f$ on ... more >>>

Normally, communication Complexity deals with how many bits
Alice and Bob need to exchange to compute f(x,y)
(Alice has x, Bob has y). We look at what happens if
Alice has x_1,x_2,...,x_n and Bob has y_1,...,y_n
and they want to compute f(x_1,y_1)... f(x_n,y_n).
THis seems hard. We look at various ... more >>>

We show that recognizing the $K_3$-freeness and $K_4$-freeness of
graphs is hard, respectively, for two-player nondeterministic
communication protocols with exponentially many partitions and for
nondeterministic (syntactic) read-$s$ times branching programs.

The key ingradient is a generalization of a coloring lemma, due to
Papadimitriou and Sipser, which says that for every ... more >>>

In model checking, program correctness on all inputs is verified
by considering the transition system underlying a given program.
In practice, the system can be intractably large.
In property testing, a property of a single input is verified
by looking at a small subset of that input.
We ... more >>>

In the simultaneous message model, two parties holding $n$-bit integers
$x,y$ send messages to a third party, the {\it referee}, enabling
him to compute a boolean function $f(x,y)$. Buhrman et al
[BCWW01] proved the remarkable result that, when $f$ is the
equality function, the referee can solve this problem by ... more >>>

We study the problem of representing symmetric Boolean functions as symmetric polynomials over Z_m. We show an equivalence between such
representations and simultaneous communication protocols. Computing a function with a polynomial of degree d modulo m=pq is equivalent to a two player protocol where one player is given the first ... more >>>

We consider the approximate nearest neighbour search problem on the
Hamming Cube $\b^d$. We show that a randomised cell probe algorithm that
uses polynomial storage and word size $d^{O(1)}$ requires a worst case
query time of $\Omega(\log\log d/\log\log\log d)$. The approximation
factor may be as loose as $2^{\log^{1-\eta}d}$ for any ... more >>>

We study private computations in information-theoretical settings on
networks that are not 2-connected. Non-2-connected networks are
``non-private'' in the sense that most functions cannot privately be
computed on such networks. We relax the notion of privacy by
introducing lossy private protocols, which generalize private
protocols. We measure the information each ... more >>>

Communication complexity is concerned with the question: how much information do the participants of a communication system need to exchange in order to perform certain tasks? The minimum number of bits that must be communicated is the deterministic communication complexity of $f$. This complexity measure was introduced by Yao \cite{1} ... more >>>

Entanglement is an essential resource for quantum communication and quantum computation, similar to shared random bits in the classical world. Entanglement distillation extracts nearly-perfect entanglement from imperfect entangled state. The classical communication complexity of these protocols is the minimal amount of classical information that needs to be exchanged for the ... more >>>

We study deterministic one-way communication complexity
of functions with Hankel communication matrices.
Some structural properties of such matrices are established
and applied to the one-way two-party communication complexity
of symmetric Boolean functions.
It is shown that the number of required communication bits
does not depend on ... more >>>

We study the problem of non-interactive correlation distillation
(NICD). Suppose Alice and Bob each has a string, denoted by
$A=a_0a_1\cdots a_{n-1}$ and $B=b_0b_1\cdots b_{n-1}$,
respectively. Furthermore, for every $k=0,1,...,n-1$, $(a_k,b_k)$ is
independently drawn from a distribution $\noise$, known as the ``noise
mode''. Alice and Bob wish to ``distill'' the correlation
more >>>

We give the first exponential separation between quantum and bounded-error randomized one-way communication complexity. Specifically, we define the Hidden Matching Problem HM_n: Alice gets as input a string x in {0,1}^n and Bob gets a perfect matching M on the n coordinates. Bob's goal is to output a tuple (i,j,b) ... more >>>

A strong direct product theorem says that if we want to compute
k independent instances of a function, using less than k times
the resources needed for one instance, then our overall success
probability will be exponentially small in k.
We establish such theorems for the classical as well as ... more >>>

A celebrated 1976 theorem of Aumann asserts that honest, rational
Bayesian agents with common priors will never "agree to disagree": if
their opinions about any topic are common knowledge, then those
opinions must be equal. Economists have written numerous papers
examining the assumptions behind this theorem. But two key questions
more >>>

We consider the P versus NP\cap coNP question for the classical two-party communication protocols: if both a boolean function and its negation have small nondeterministic communication complexity, what is then its deterministic and/or probabilistic communication complexity? In the fixed (worst) partition case this question was answered by Aho, Ullman and ... more >>>

Alice and Bob want to know if two strings of length $n$ are
almost equal. That is, do they differ on at most $a$ bits?
Let $0\le a\le n-1$.
We show that any deterministic protocol, as well as any
error-free quantum protocol ($C^*$ version), for this problem
requires at ... more >>>

We prove that an \omega(log^3 n) lower bound for the three-party number-on-the-forehead (NOF) communication complexity of the set-disjointness function implies an n^\omega(1) size lower bound for tree-like Lovasz-Schrijver systems that refute unsatisfiable CNFs. More generally, we prove that an n^\Omega(1) lower bound for the (k+1)-party NOF communication complexity of set-disjointness ... more >>>

A private approximation of a function f is defined to be another function F that approximates f in the usual sense, but does not reveal any information about the input x other than what can be deduced from f(x). We give the first two-party private approximation of the Euclidean distance ... more >>>

This paper introduces a new technique for removing existential quantifiers
over quantum states. Using this technique, we show that there is no way
to pack an exponential number of bits into a polynomial-size quantum
state, in such a way that the value of any one of those bits ... more >>>

A two server private information retrieval (PIR) scheme
allows a user U to retrieve the i-th bit of an
n-bit string x replicated between two servers while each
server individually learns no information about i. The main
parameter of interest in a PIR scheme is its communication
complexity, namely the ... more >>>

We consider computationally-efficient incentive-compatible
mechanisms that use the VCG payment scheme, and study how well they
can approximate the social welfare in auction settings. We obtain a
$2$-approximation for multi-unit auctions, and show that this is
best possible, even though from a purely computational perspective
an FPTAS exists. For combinatorial ... more >>>

We give an exponential separation between one-way quantum and classical communication complexity for a Boolean function. Earlier such a separation was known only for a relation. A very similar result was obtained earlier but independently by Kerenidis and Raz [KR06]. Our version of the result gives an example in the ... more >>>

We give a tight lower bound of Omega(\sqrt{n}) for the randomized one-way communication complexity of the Boolean Hidden Matching Problem [BJK04]. Since there is a quantum one-way communication complexity protocol of O(log n) qubits for this problem, we obtain an exponential separation of quantum and classical one-way communication complexity for ... more >>>

Traditional quantum state tomography requires a number of measurements that grows exponentially with the number of qubits n. But using ideas from computational learning theory, we show that "for most practical purposes" one can learn a state using a number of measurements that grows only linearly with n. Besides possible ... more >>>

We study languages with bounded communication complexity in the multiparty "input on the forehead" model with worst-case partition. In the two party case, it is known that such languages are exactly those that are recognized by programs over commutative monoids. This can be used to show that these languages can ... more >>>

We examine the communication required for generating random variables
remotely. One party Alice will be given a distribution D, and she
has to send a message to Bob, who is then required to generate a
value with distribution exactly D. Alice and Bob are allowed
to share random bits generated ... more >>>

We consider the $k$-layer pointer jumping problem in the one-way
multi-party number-on-the-forehead communication model. In this problem,
the input is a layered directed graph with each vertex having outdegree
$1$, shared amongst $k$ players: Player~$i$ knows all layers {\em
except} the $i$th. The players must communicate, in the order
$1,2,\ldots,k$, ... more >>>

The Earth Mover Distance (EMD) between two equal-size sets
of points in R^d is defined to be the minimum cost of a
bipartite matching between the two pointsets. It is a natural metric
for comparing sets of features, and as such, it has received
significant interest in computer vision. Motivated ... more >>>

A basic question in complexity theory is whether the computational
resources required for solving k independent instances of the same
problem scale as k times the resources required for one instance.
We investigate this question in various models of classical
communication complexity.

We define a new measure, the subdistribution bound, ... more >>>

We solve an open problem of Kushilevitz and Nisan
(1997) in communication complexity. Let $R_{eps}(f)$
and $D^{mu}_{eps}(f)$ denote the randomized and
$mu$-distributional communication complexities of
f, respectively ($eps$ a small constant). Yao's
well-known Minimax Principle states that
R_{eps}(f) = max_{mu} { D^{mu}_{eps}(f) }.
Kushilevitz and Nisan (1997) ask whether ... more >>>

We give the first exponential separation between quantum and
classical multi-party
communication complexity in the (non-interactive) one-way and
simultaneous message
passing settings.
For every k, we demonstrate a relational communication problem
between k parties
that can be solved exactly by a quantum simultaneous message passing
protocol of
cost O(log ... more >>>

In this paper we study the one-way multi-party communication model,
in which every party speaks exactly once in its turn. For every
fixed $k$, we prove a tight lower bound of
$\Omega{n^{1/(k-1)}}$ on the probabilistic communication
complexity of pointer jumping in a $k$-layered tree, where the
pointers of the $i$-th ... more >>>

We study multilinear formulas, monotone arithmetic circuits, maximal-partition discrepancy, best-partition communication complexity and extractors constructions. We start by proving lower bounds for an explicit polynomial for the following three subclasses of syntactically multilinear arithmetic formulas over the field C and the set of variables {x1,...,xn}:

1. Noise-resistant. A syntactically multilinear ... more >>>

In a breakthrough result, Razborov (2003) gave optimal
lower bounds on the communication complexity of every function f
of the form f(x,y)=D(|x AND y|) for some D:{0,1,...,n}->{0,1}, in
the bounded-error quantum model with and without prior entanglement.
This was proved by the _multidimensional_ discrepancy method. We
give an entirely different ... more >>>

The sign-rank of a real matrix M is the least rank
of a matrix R in which every entry has the same sign as the
corresponding entry of M. We determine the sign-rank of every
matrix of the form M=[ D(|x AND y|) ]_{x,y}, where
D:{0,1,...,n}->{-1,+1} is given and x ... more >>>

Any proof of P!=NP will have to overcome two barriers: relativization
and natural proofs. Yet over the last decade, we have seen circuit
lower bounds (for example, that PP does not have linear-size circuits)
that overcome both barriers simultaneously. So the question arises of
whether there ... more >>>

We provide a non-explicit separation of the number-on-forehead communication complexity classes RP and NP when the number of players is up to \delta log(n) for any \delta<1. Recent lower bounds on Set-Disjointness [LS08,CA08] provide an explicit separation between these classes when the number of players is only up to o(loglog(n)).

The sign-rank of a matrix A=[A_{ij}] with +/-1 entries
is the least rank of a real matrix B=[B_{ij}] with A_{ij}B_{ij}>0
for all i,j. We obtain the first exponential lower bound on the
sign-rank of a function in AC^0. Namely, let
f(x,y)=\bigwedge_{i=1}^m\bigvee_{j=1}^{m^2} (x_{ij}\wedge y_{ij}).
We show that the matrix [f(x,y)]_{x,y} has ... more >>>

Recently, an extension of the standard data stream model has been introduced in which an algorithm can create and manipulate multiple read/write streams in addition to its input data stream. Like the data stream model, the most important parameter for this model is the amount of internal memory used by ... more >>>

Representations of Boolean functions by real polynomials
play an important role in complexity theory. Typically,
one is interested in the least degree of a polynomial
p(x_1,...,x_n) that approximates or sign-represents
a given Boolean function f(x_1,...,x_n). This article
surveys a new and growing body of work in communication
complexity that centers ... more >>>

We prove n^Omega(1) lower bounds on the multiparty communication complexity of AC^0 functions in the number-on-forehead (NOF) model for up to Theta(log n) players. These are the first lower bounds for any AC^0 function for omega(loglog n) players. In particular we show that there are families of depth 3 read-once ... more >>>

We prove an n^{Omega(1)}/2^{O(k)} lower bound on the randomized k-party communication complexity of read-once depth 4 AC^0 functions in the number-on-forehead (NOF) model for O(log n) players. These are the first non-trivial lower bounds for general NOF multiparty communication complexity for any AC^0 function for omega(log log n) players. For ... more >>>

A very important problem in quantum communication complexity is to show that there is, or isn?t, an exponential gap between randomized and quantum complexity for a total function. There are currently no clear candidate functions for such a separation; and there are fewer and fewer randomized lower bound techniques that ... more >>>

We prove lower bounds on the randomized two-party communication complexity of functions that arise from read-once boolean formulae.

A read-once boolean formula is a formula in propositional logic with the property that every variable appears exactly once. Such a formula can be represented by a tree, where the leaves correspond ... more >>>

The Gap-Hamming-Distance problem arose in the context of proving space
lower bounds for a number of key problems in the data stream model. In
this problem, Alice and Bob have to decide whether the Hamming distance
between their $n$-bit input strings is large (i.e., at least $n/2 +
\sqrt n$) ... more >>>

We define a hierarchy of complexity classes that lie between P and RP, yielding a new way of quantifying partial progress towards the derandomization of RP. A standard approach in derandomization is to reduce the number of random bits an algorithm uses. We instead focus on a model of computation ... more >>>

Does computing n copies of a function require n times the computational effort? In this work, we

give the first non-trivial answer to this question for the model of randomized communication

complexity.

We show that:

1. Computing n copies of a function requires sqrt{n} times the communication.

2. ... more >>>

We present a generic method for converting any family of unsatisfiable CNF formulas that require large resolution rank into CNF formulas whose refutation requires large rank for proof systems that manipulate polynomials or polynomial threshold functions of degree at most $k$ (known as ${\rm Th}(k)$ proofs). Such systems include: Lovasz-Schrijver ... more >>>

This paper makes three main contributions to the theory of communication complexity and stream computation. First, we present new bounds on the information complexity of AUGMENTED-INDEX. In contrast to analogous results for INDEX by Jain, Radhakrishnan and Sen [J. ACM, 2009], we have to overcome the significant technical challenge that ... more >>>

In an unpublished Russian manuscript Razborov proved that a matrix family with high
rigidity over a finite field would yield a language outside the polynomial hierarchy
in communication complexity.

We present an alternative proof that strengthens the original result in several ways.
In particular, we replace rigidity by the strictly ... more >>>

We prove an optimal $\Omega(n)$ lower bound on the randomized
communication complexity of the much-studied
Gap-Hamming-Distance problem. As a consequence, we
obtain essentially optimal multi-pass space lower bounds in the
data stream model for a number of fundamental problems, including
the estimation of frequency moments.

The Gap-Hamming-Distance problem is a ... more >>>

In STOC 1999, Raz presented a (partial) function for which there is a quantum protocol
communicating only $O(\log n)$ qubits, but for which any classical (randomized, bounded-error) protocol requires $\poly(n)$ bits of communication. That quantum protocol requires two rounds of communication. Ever since Raz's paper it was open whether the ... more >>>

We study the communication complexity of symmetric XOR functions, namely functions $f: \{0,1\}^n \times \{0,1\}^n \rightarrow \{0,1\}$ that can be formulated as $f(x,y)=D(|x\oplus y|)$ for some predicate $D: \{0,1,...,n\} \rightarrow \{0,1\}$, where $|x\oplus y|$ is the Hamming weight of the bitwise XOR of $x$ and $y$. We give a public-coin ... more >>>

In 1992, Schulman proved a coding theorem for interactive communication and demonstrated that interactive communication protocols can be made robust to noise with only a constant slow-down (for a sufficiently small error rate) through a black-box reduction. However, this scheme is not computationally {\em efficient}: the running time to construct ... more >>>

We study the communication complexity of evaluating functions when the input data is randomly allocated (according to some known distribution) amongst two or more players, possibly with information overlap. This naturally extends previously studied variable partition models such as the best-case and worst-case partition models. We aim to understand whether ... more >>>

In the gap Hamming distance problem, two parties must
determine whether their respective strings $x,y\in\{0,1\}^n$
are at Hamming distance less than $n/2-\sqrt n$ or greater
than $n/2+\sqrt n.$ In a recent tour de force, Chakrabarti and
Regev (STOC '11) proved the long-conjectured $\Omega(n)$ bound
on the randomized communication complexity ... more >>>

We study differential privacy in a distributed setting where two parties would like to perform analysis of their joint data while preserving privacy for both datasets. Our results imply almost tight lower bounds on the accuracy of such data analyses, both for specific natural functions (such as Hamming distance) and ... more >>>

Let $C$ be a (fan-in $2$) Boolean circuit of size $s$ and depth $d$, and let $x$ be an input for $C$. Assume that a verifier that knows $C$ but doesn't know $x$ can access the low degree extension of $x$ at one random point. Two competing provers try to ... more >>>

The primary goal of this paper is to define and study the interactive information complexity of functions. Let $f(x,y)$ be a function, and suppose Alice is given $x$ and Bob is given $y$. Informally, the interactive information complexity $IC(f)$ of $f$ is the least amount of information Alice and Bob ... more >>>

Suppose each of $k \le n^{o(1)}$ players holds an $n$-bit number $x_i$ in its hand. The players wish to determine if $\sum_{i \le k} x_i = s$. We give a public-coin protocol with error $1\%$ and communication $O(k \lg k)$. The communication bound is independent of $n$, and for $k ... more >>>

We study the $k$-party `number on the forehead' communication complexity of composed functions $f \circ \vec{g}$, where $f:\{0,1\}^n \to \{\pm 1\}$, $\vec{g} = (g_1,\ldots,g_n)$, $g_i : \{0,1\}^k \to \{0,1\}$ and for $(x_1,\ldots,x_k) \in (\{0,1\}^n)^k$, $f \circ \vec{g}(x_1,\ldots,x_k) = f(\ldots,g_i(x_{1,i},\ldots,x_{k,i}), \ldots)$. When $\vec{g} = (g,g,\ldots,g)$ we denote $f \circ \vec{g}$ by ... more >>>