Planar embeddability of the vertices of a graph using a fixed point set is NP-hard

Abstract

Let G = (V, E) be a graph with n vertices and let P be a set of n points in the plane. We show that deciding whether there is a planar straight-line embedding of G such that the vertices V are embedded onto the points P is NP-complete, even when G is 2-connected and 2-outerplanar. This settles an open problem posed in [P. Bose. On embedding an outer-planar graph in a point set. Comput. Geom. Theory Appl., 23:303-312, November 2002. A preliminary version appeared in Graph Drawing (Proc. GD ’97), LNCS 1353, pg. 25-36, F. Brandenberg, D. Eppstein, M.T. Goodrich, S.G. Kobourov, G. Liotta, and P. Mutzel. Selected open problems in graph drawing. In Graph Drawing (Proc. GD’03), LNCS, 2003. To appear y M. Kaufmann and R. Wiese. Embedding vertices at points: Few bends suffice for planar graphs. Journal of Graph Algorithms and Applications, 6(1):115–129, 2002. A preliminary version appeared in Graph Drawing (Proc. GD ’99), LNCS 1731, pg. 165–174].