In this paper, we explore the limits of algorithmic meta-theorems for combinatorial reconfiguration on graphs and prove several intractability results for highly restricted cases, which tightly complement the positive results by Mouawad et al. [IPEC 2014] and Gima et al. [Algorithmica 2024]. In this setting, we study reconfiguration problems on graphs in which the feasible sets are defined by formulas of first-order or monadic second-order logic: for a formula φ(X) with a free set variable X, the problem asks whether two given sets are connected by a token-jumping sequence in which every set satisfies φ on the input graph. Our main contribution is to show that the problem is intractable even for first-order logic and for severely restricted graphs, such as paths and disjoint unions of stars or cliques. Combined with known results, these results settle the parameterized complexity for most of the well-studied structural parameters. We also study the setting where the sets to be reconfigured are small, i.e., their size is part of the parameter, and show that even in this setting the problem is hard for caterpillars, whereas it becomes tractable even for monadic second-order logic when parameterized additionally by shrub-depth.

We consider the Steiner Orientation problem, where we are given as input a mixed graph G = (V,E,A) and a set of k demand pairs (s_i,t_i), i ∈ [k]. The goal is to orient the undirected edges of G in a way that the resulting directed graph has a directed path from s_i to t_i for all i ∈ [k]. We adopt the point of view of structural parameterized complexity and investigate the complexity of Steiner Orientation for standard measures, such as treewidth. Our results indicate that Steiner Orientation is a surprisingly hard problem from this point of view. In particular, our main contributions are the following: 1) We show that Steiner Orientation is NP-complete on instances where the underlying graph has feedback vertex number 2, treewidth 2, pathwidth 3, and vertex integrity 6. 2) We present an XP algorithm parameterized by vertex cover number vc of complexity n^O(vc²). Furthermore, we show that this running time is essentially optimal by proving that a running time of n^o(vc²) would refute the ETH. 3) We consider parameterizations by the number of undirected or directed edges (|E| or |A|) and we observe that the trivial 2^|E| n^O(1)-time algorithm for the former parameter is optimal under the SETH. Complementing this, we show that the problem admits a 2^O(|A|) n^O(1)-time algorithm. In addition to the above, we consider the complexity of Steiner Orientation parameterized by tw+k (FPT), distance to clique (FPT), and vc+k (FPT with a polynomial kernel).

In the Telephone Broadcast problem we are given a graph G = (V,E) with a designated source vertex s ∈ V. Our goal is to transmit a message, which is initially known only to s, to all vertices of the graph by using a process where in each round an informed vertex may transmit the message to one of its uninformed neighbors. The optimization objective is to minimize the number of rounds. Following up on several recent works, we investigate the structurally parameterized complexity of Telephone Broadcast. In particular, we first strengthen existing NP-hardness results by showing that the problem remains NP-complete on graphs of bounded tree-depth and also on cactus graphs which are one vertex deletion away from being path forests. Motivated by this (severe) hardness, we study several other parameterizations of the problem and obtain FPT algorithms parameterized by vertex integrity (generalizing a recent FPT algorithm parameterized by vertex cover by Fomin, Fraigniaud, and Golovach [TCS 2024]) and by distance to clique, as well as FPT approximation algorithms parameterized by clique-cover and cluster vertex deletion. Furthermore, we obtain structural results that relate the length of the optimal broadcast protocol of a graph G with its pathwidth and tree-depth. By presenting a substantial improvement over the best previously known bound for pathwidth (Aminian, Kamali, Seyed-Javadi, and Sumedha [ICALP 2025]) we exponentially improve the approximation ratio achievable in polynomial time on graphs of bounded pathwidth from 𝒪(4^pw) to 𝒪(pw).

In this paper we study the Spanning Tree Congestion problem, where we are given an undirected graph G = (V,E) and are asked to find a spanning tree T of minimum maximum congestion. Here, the congestion of an edge e ∈ T is the number of edges uv ∈ E such that the (unique) path from u to v in T traverses e. We consider this well-studied NP-hard problem from the point of view of (structural) parameterized complexity and obtain the following results: - We resolve a natural open problem by showing that Spanning Tree Congestion is not FPT parameterized by treewidth (under standard assumptions). More strongly, we present a generic reduction which applies to (almost) any parameter of the form "vertex-deletion distance to class 𝒞", thus obtaining W[1]-hardness for more restricted parameters, including tree-depth plus feedback vertex set, or incomparable to treewidth, such as twin cover. Via a slight tweak of the same reduction we also show that the problem is NP-complete on graphs of modular-width 4. - Even though it is known that Spanning Tree Congestion remains NP-hard on instances with only one vertex of unbounded degree, it is currently open whether the problem remains hard on bounded-degree graphs. We resolve this question by showing NP-hardness on graphs of maximum degree 8. - Complementing the problem’s W[1]-hardness for treewidth, we formulate an algorithm that runs in time roughly {(k+w)}^{𝒪(w)}, where k is the desired congestion and w the treewidth, improving a previous argument for parameter k+w that was based on Courcelle’s theorem. This explicit algorithm pays off in two ways: it allows us to obtain an FPT approximation scheme for parameter treewidth, that is, a (1+ε)-approximation running in time roughly {(w/ε)}^{𝒪(w)}; and it leads to an exact FPT algorithm for parameter clique-width+k via a Win/Win argument. - Finally, motivated by the problem’s hardness for most standard structural parameters, we present FPT algorithms for several more restricted cases, namely, for the parameters vertex-deletion distance to clique; vertex integrity; and feedback edge set, in the latter case also achieving a single-exponential running time dependence on the parameter.