The lectures concentrate on highlights in Combinatorial (ChaptersII and III) and Number Theoretical (ChapterIV) Extremal Theory, in particular on the solution of famous problems which were open for many decades. However, the organization of the lectures in six chapters does neither follow the historic developments nor the connections between ideas in several cases. With the speci?ed auxiliary results in ChapterI on Probability Theory, Graph Theory, etc., all chapters can be read and taught independently of one another. In addition to the 16 lectures organized in 6 chapters of the main part of the book, there is supplementary material for most of them in the Appendix. In parti- lar, there are applications and further exercises, research problems, conjectures, and even research programs. The following books and reports [B97], [ACDKPSWZ00], [A01], and [ABCABDM06], mostly of the authors, are frequently cited in this book, especially in the Appendix, and we therefore mark them by short labels as [B], [N], [E], and [G]. We emphasize that there are also “Exercises” in [B], a “Problem Section” with contributions by several authors on pages 1063–1105 of [G], which are often of a combinatorial nature, and “Problems and Conjectures” on pages 172–173 of [E].

From the reviews: "About 30 years ago, when I was a student, the first book on combinatorial optimization came out referred to as "the Lawler" simply. I think that now, with this volume Springer has landed a coup: "The Schrijver". The box is offered for less than 90.- EURO, which to my opinion is one of the best deals after the introduction of this currency." OR-Spectrum

The fourth volume of Rudolf Ahlswede’s lectures on Information Theory is focused on Combinatorics. Ahlswede was originally motivated to study combinatorial aspects of Information Theory via zero-error codes: in this case the structure of the coding problems usually drastically changes from probabilistic to combinatorial. The best example is Shannon’s zero error capacity, where independent sets in graphs have to be examined. The extension to multiple access channels leads to the Zarankiewicz problem. A code can be regarded combinatorially as a hypergraph; and many coding theorems can be obtained by appropriate colourings or coverings of the underlying hypergraphs. Several such colouring and covering techniques and their applications are introduced in this book. Furthermore, codes produced by permutations and one of Ahlswede’s favourite research fields -- extremal problems in Combinatorics -- are presented. Whereas the first part of the book concentrates on combinatorial methods in order to analyse classical codes as prefix codes or codes in the Hamming metric, the second is devoted to combinatorial models in Information Theory. Here the code concept already relies on a rather combinatorial structure, as in several concrete models of multiple access channels or more refined distortions. An analytical tool coming into play, especially during the analysis of perfect codes, is the use of orthogonal polynomials. Classical information processing concerns the main tasks of gaining knowledge and the storage, transmission and hiding of data. The first task is the prime goal of Statistics. For transmission and hiding data, Shannon developed an impressive mathematical theory called Information Theory, which he based on probabilistic models. The theory largely involves the concept of codes with small error probabilities in spite of noise in the transmission, which is modeled by channels. The lectures presented in this work are suitable for graduate students in Mathematics, and also for those working in Theoretical Computer Science, Physics, and Electrical Engineering with a background in basic Mathematics. The lectures can be used as the basis for courses or to supplement courses in many ways. Ph.D. students will also find research problems, often with conjectures, that offer potential subjects for a thesis. More advanced researchers may find questions which form the basis of entire research programs.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 16th International Symposium on Graph Drawing, GD 2008, held in Heraklion, Crete, Greece, during September 21-24, 2008. The 31 long papers and 8 short papers presented together with 10 posters and two invited papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 83 submissions. The volume also includes a report on the Graph Drawing Contest which was held during the conference. An important aspect of the conference is bridging the gap between theoretical advances and implemented solutions of geometric representation of graphs and networks. It is motivated by those applications where it is crucial to visualize structural information as graphs.

Theory of Linear and Integer Programming Alexander Schrijver Centrum voor Wiskunde en Informatica, Amsterdam, The Netherlands This book describes the theory of linear and integer programming and surveys the algorithms for linear and integer programming problems, focusing on complexity analysis. It aims at complementing the more practically oriented books in this field. A special feature is the author's coverage of important recent developments in linear and integer programming. Applications to combinatorial optimization are given, and the author also includes extensive historical surveys and bibliographies. The book is intended for graduate students and researchers in operations research, mathematics and computer science. It will also be of interest to mathematical historians. Contents 1 Introduction and preliminaries; 2 Problems, algorithms, and complexity; 3 Linear algebra and complexity; 4 Theory of lattices and linear diophantine equations; 5 Algorithms for linear diophantine equations; 6 Diophantine approximation and basis reduction; 7 Fundamental concepts and results on polyhedra, linear inequalities, and linear programming; 8 The structure of polyhedra; 9 Polarity, and blocking and anti-blocking polyhedra; 10 Sizes and the theoretical complexity of linear inequalities and linear programming; 11 The simplex method; 12 Primal-dual, elimination, and relaxation methods; 13 Khachiyan's method for linear programming; 14 The ellipsoid method for polyhedra more generally; 15 Further polynomiality results in linear programming; 16 Introduction to integer linear programming; 17 Estimates in integer linear programming; 18 The complexity of integer linear programming; 19 Totally unimodular matrices: fundamental properties and examples; 20 Recognizing total unimodularity; 21 Further theory related to total unimodularity; 22 Integral polyhedra and total dual integrality; 23 Cutting planes; 24 Further methods in integer linear programming; Historical and further notes on integer linear programming; References; Notation index; Author index; Subject index

This volume, the third in a sequence that began with The Theory of Matroids and Combinatorial Geometries, concentrates on the applications of matroid theory to a variety of topics from engineering (rigidity and scene analysis), combinatorics (graphs, lattices, codes and designs), topology and operations research (the greedy algorithm).