Carla Groenland ; Tom Johnston ; Jamie Radcliffe ; Alex Scott - Short reachability networks

dmtcs:12454 - Discrete Mathematics & Theoretical Computer Science, November 4, 2025, vol. 27:3 - https://doi.org/10.46298/dmtcs.12454
Short reachability networksArticle

Authors: Carla Groenland ; Tom Johnston ; Jamie Radcliffe ; Alex Scott

    We investigate the following generalisation of permutation networks. We say a sequence $T=(T_1,\dots,T_\ell)$ of transpositions in $S_n$ forms a $t$-reachability network if, for every choice of $t$ distinct points $x_1, \dots, x_t\in \{1,\dots,n\}$, there is a subsequence of $T$ whose composition maps $j$ to $x_j$ for every $1\leq j\leq t$. When $t=n$, any permutation in $S_n$ can be created and $T$ is a permutation network. Waksman [JACM, 1968] showed that the shortest permutation networks have length about $n \log_2(n)$. In this paper, we investigate the shortest $t$-reachability networks for other values of $t$. Our main result settles the case of $t=2$: the shortest $2$-reachability network has length $\lceil 3n/2\rceil-2 $. For fixed $t \geq 3$, we give a simple randomised construction which shows that there exist $t$-reachability networks with $(2+o_t(1))n$ transpositions. We also study the effect of restricting to star-transpositions, i.e. restricting all transpositions to have the form $(1, \cdot)$.

    12 pages, 1 figure


    Volume: vol. 27:3
    Section: Combinatorics
    Published on: November 4, 2025
    Accepted on: October 1, 2025
    Submitted on: October 22, 2023
    Keywords: Combinatorics

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