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Deep Reinforcement Learning for Network Dismantling: A K-Core Based Approach

Author

Listed:
  • Tianle Pu

    (College of Systems Engineering, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, China)

  • Li Zeng

    (College of Systems Engineering, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, China
    School of International Business and Management, Sichuan International Studies University, Chongqing 400031, China)

  • Chao Chen

    (College of Systems Engineering, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, China)

Abstract

Network dismantling is one of the most challenging problems in complex systems. This problem encompasses a broad array of practical applications. Previous works mainly focus on the metrics such as the number of nodes in the Giant Connected Component (GCC), average pairwise connectivity, etc. This paper introduces a novel metric, the accumulated 2-core size, for assessing network dismantling. Due to the NP-hard computational complexity of this problem, we propose SmartCore, an end-to-end model for minimizing the accumulated 2-core size by leveraging reinforcement learning and graph neural networks. Extensive experiments across synthetic and real-world datasets demonstrate SmartCore’s superiority over existing methods in terms of both accuracy and speed, suggesting that SmartCore should be a better choice for the network dismantling problem in practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Tianle Pu & Li Zeng & Chao Chen, 2024. "Deep Reinforcement Learning for Network Dismantling: A K-Core Based Approach," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 12(8), pages 1-12, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jmathe:v:12:y:2024:i:8:p:1215-:d:1377902
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
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