We define a distance of two graphs that reflects the closeness of both local and global properties. We also define convergence of a sequence of graphs, and show that a graph sequence is convergent if and only if it is Cauchy in this distance. Every convergent graph sequence has a limit in the form of a symmetric measurable function in two variables. We use these notions of distance and graph limits to give a general theory for parameter testing. As examples, we provide short proofs of the testability of MaxCut and the recent result of Alon and Shapira about the testability of hereditary graph properties.

We further develop the group-theoretic approach to fast matrix multiplication introduced by Cohn and Umans, and for the first time use it to derive algorithms asymptotically faster than the standard algorithm. We describe several families of wreath product groups that achieve matrix multiplication exponent less than 3, the asymptotically fastest of which achieves exponent 2.41. We present two conjectures regarding specific improvements, one combinatorial and the other algebraic. Either one would imply that the exponent of matrix multiplication is 2.