P, NP, NP Classes

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In computer science, there exist some problems whose solutions are not yet found, the problems are
divided into classes known as Complexity Classes. In complexity theory, a Complexity Class is a set of
problems with related complexity. These classes help scientists to group problems based on how much
time and space they require to solve problems and verify the solutions. It is the branch of the theory of
computation that deals with the resources required to solve a problem.

The common resources are time and space, meaning how much time the algorithm takes to solve a
problem and the corresponding memory usage.

The time complexity of an algorithm is used to describe the number of steps required to solve a
problem, but it can also be used to describe how long it takes to verify the answer.

The space complexity of an algorithm describes how much memory is required for the algorithm to
operate.

Complexity classes are useful in organising similar types of problems.

Types of Complexity Classes

This article discusses the following complexity classes:

P Class

NP Class

CoNP Class

NP-hard

NP-complete

P Class
The P in the P class stands for Polynomial Time. It is the collection of decision problems(problems with a
“yes” or “no” answer) that can be solved by a deterministic machine in polynomial time.

Features:

The solution to P problems is easy to find.

P is often a class of computational problems that are solvable and tractable. Tractable means that the
problems can be solved in theory as well as in practice. But the problems that can be solved in theory
but not in practice are known as intractable.

This class contains many problems:

Calculating the greatest common divisor.

Finding a maximum matching.

Merge Sort

NP Class
The NP in NP class stands for Non-deterministic Polynomial Time. It is the collection of decision
problems that can be solved by a non-deterministic machine in polynomial time.

Features:

The solutions of the NP class are hard to find since they are being solved by a non-deterministic machine
but the solutions are easy to verify.

Problems of NP can be verified by a Turing machine in polynomial time.

Example:

Let us consider an example to better understand the NP class. Suppose there is a company having a total
of 1000 employees having unique employee IDs. Assume that there are 200 rooms available for them. A
selection of 200 employees must be paired together, but the CEO of the company has the data of some
employees who can’t work in the same room due to personal reasons.
This is an example of an NP problem. Since it is easy to check if the given choice of 200 employees
proposed by a coworker is satisfactory or not i.e. no pair taken from the coworker list appears on the list
given by the CEO. But generating such a list from scratch seems to be so hard as to be completely
impractical.

It indicates that if someone can provide us with the solution to the problem, we can find the correct and
incorrect pair in polynomial time. Thus for the NP class problem, the answer is possible, which can be
calculated in polynomial time.

This class contains many problems that one would like to be able to solve effectively:

Boolean Satisfiability Problem (SAT).

Hamiltonian Path Problem.

Graph coloring.

Co-NP Class
Co-NP stands for the complement of NP Class. It means if the answer to a problem in Co-NP is No, then
there is proof that can be checked in polynomial time.

Features:

If a problem X is in NP, then its complement X’ is also in CoNP.

For an NP and CoNP problem, there is no need to verify all the answers at once in polynomial time,
there is a need to verify only one particular answer “yes” or “no” in polynomial time for a problem to be
in NP or CoNP.

Some example problems for CoNP are:

To check prime number.

Integer Factorization.

NP-hard class
An NP-hard problem is at least as hard as the hardest problem in NP and it is a class of problems such
that every problem in NP reduces to NP-hard.

Features:

All NP-hard problems are not in NP.

It takes a long time to check them. This means if a solution for an NP-hard problem is given then it takes
a long time to check whether it is right or not.

A problem A is in NP-hard if, for every problem L in NP, there exists a polynomial-time reduction from L
to A.

Some of the examples of problems in Np-hard are:

Halting problem.
Qualified Boolean formulas.

No Hamiltonian cycle.

NP-complete class
A problem is NP-complete if it is both NP and NP-hard. NP-complete problems are the hard problems in
NP.

Features:

NP-complete problems are special as any problem in NP class can be transformed or reduced into NP-
complete problems in polynomial time.

If one could solve an NP-complete problem in polynomial time, then one could also solve any NP
problem in polynomial time.

Some example problems include:

Hamiltonian Cycle.

Satisfiability.

Vertex cover.

Complexity
Characteristic feature
Class

P Easily solvable in polynomial time.

NP Yes, answers can be checked in polynomial time.

Co-NP No, answers can be checked in polynomial time.

All NP-hard problems are not in NP and it takes a long time to check
NP-hard
them.

NP-complete A problem that is NP and NP-hard is NP-complete.

Prerequisite: NP-Completeness
NP Problem:
The NP problems set of problems whose solutions are hard to find but easy to verify and are solved
by Non-Deterministic Machine in polynomial time.

NP-Hard Problem:
A Problem X is NP-Hard if there is an NP-Complete problem Y, such that Y is reducible to X in polynomial
time. NP-Hard problems are as hard as NP-Complete problems. NP-Hard Problem need not be in NP
class.

If every problem of NP can be polynomial time reduced to it called as NP Hard.

A lot of times takes the particular problem solve and reducing different problems.

example :

Hamiltonian cycle .

optimization problem .

Shortest path

NP-Complete Problem:

A problem X is NP-Complete if there is an NP problem Y, such that Y is reducible to X in polynomial time.

NP-Complete problems are as hard as NP problems. A problem is NP-Complete if it is a part of both NP
and NP-Hard Problem. A non-deterministic Turing machine can solve NP-Complete problem in
polynomial time.

A problem is np-complete when it is both np and np hard combines together.

this means np complete problems can be verified in polynomial time.

Example:

Decision problems.

Regular graphs.

Difference between NP-Hard and NP-Complete:

NP-hard NP-Complete

NP-Hard problems (say X) can be

NP-Complete problems can be solved by a
solved if and only if there is a NP-
non-deterministic Algorithm/Turing Machine
Complete problem (say Y) that can be
in polynomial time.
reducible into X in polynomial time.

To solve this problem, it do not have to To solve this problem, it must be both NP and
be in NP . NP-hard problems.
 NP-hard NP-Complete

Time is unknown in NP-Hard. Time is known as it is fixed in NP-Hard.

NP-Complete is exclusively a decision

NP-hard is not a decision problem.
problem.

Not all NP-hard problems are NP-

All NP-complete problems are NP-hard
complete.

Do not have to be a Decision problem. It is exclusively a Decision problem.

It is optimization problem used. It is Decision problem used.

Example: Determine whether a graph has a

Example: Halting problem, Vertex Hamiltonian cycle, Determine whether a
cover problem, etc. Boolean formula is satisfiable or not, Circuit-
satisfiability problem, etc.