Optimizing Wiener and Randić Indices of Graphs

Abstract

Wiener and Randić indices have long been studied in chemical graph theory as connection strength measures of graphs. Later, these indices were used in different fields such as network analysis. We consider two optimization problems related to these indices, with potential applications to network theory, in particular to epidemiological networks. Given a connected graph and a fixed total edge weight, we investigate how individual weights must be assigned to edges, minimizing the connection strength of the graph. In order to measure the connection strength, we use the weighted Wiener index and a modified version of the ordinary Randić index. Wiener index optimization is linear, while Randić index optimization turns out to be both nonlinear and nonconvex. Hence, we adopt the technique of separable programming to generate solutions. We present our experimental results by applying relevant algorithms to several graphs.