Department of
Applied
Mathematics

Jirka Matoušek Prize Noon lecture: Approximating Edit Distance Within Constant Factor in Truly Sub-Quadratic Time

Debarati Das

IUUK

Abstract

Edit distance is a measure of similarity of two strings based on the minimum number of character insertions, deletions, and substitutions required to transform one string into the other. The edit distance can be computed exactly using a dynamic programming algorithm that runs in quadratic time. Andoni, Krauthgamer and Onak (2010) gave a nearly linear time algorithm that approximates edit distance within approximation factor $\text{poly}(\log n)$. In this talk, I will describe an algorithm with running time $\tildeO(n^{2-2/7})$ that approximates the edit distance within a constant factor.

This is a joint work with Diptarka Chakraborty, Elazar Goldenberg, Michal Koucky, Michael Saks.