General Information

The European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA) covers research in efficient algorithms and data structures in computer science, discrete applied mathematics, operations research and mathematical programming. Starting from 2002, the symposium has two tracks:

  • Design and Analysis Track Design and mathematical analysis of algorithms
  • Engineering and Application Track Real-world applications, engineering and experimental analysis of algorithms
  • New in 2022: Simplicity Track Proofs or algorithms that show already known results in a much more simple and elegant way

Each track has its own program committee. Papers are submitted to a particular track, but the committees have the right to move papers between tracks.

In 2014, the ESA community decided to start an ESA Test-of-Time Award to recognize paper(s) from ESA Proceedings from 19-21 years ago which are still influential and stimulating for the field today.

News

  • New Simplicity Track (S) This year, the European Symposium on Algorithms ESA’22 will have a Track S (for Simplicity) inviting contributions that simplify algorithmic results. We would like to expand the community around simplification of algorithmic results, encourage and reward research towards simplification and clarity. We find that simpler algorithms are easier to implement, bridging the gap between theory and practice, and we find that new simple or elegant proofs are easier to understand and to teach, and may contain interesting new insights whose relevance only the future will reveal. Track S submissions will primarily be judged on the simplicity and elegance of their proofs or algorithms, and the clarity of their presentation. Submissions that improve on the state of the art from a theoretical or practical viewpoint should instead be submitted to tracks A or B. Track S runs as an experiment for the 2022 ESA in Potsdam, Germany, and the submission/acceptance deadlines follow the schedule for tracks A and B.
  • The ESA Test-of-Time Award 2021 goes to the following two papers
    • Andrew Goldberg, Jason Hartline:
      Competitive Auctions for Multiple Digital Goods
      Proceedings ESA’01 The paper is part of a foundational line of work by the authors on designing auctions for digital goods, which are goods such as software, music, and videos that are in unlimited supply. The work focuses on competitive auctions that encourage consumers to bid their utility values by providing yield revenue within a constant factor of the optimal fixed pricing. The paper initiates a study of the important case of multiple digital goods and extends on prior work focused on a single digital good.
    • Giuseppe Lancia, Vineet Bafna, Sorin Istrail, Ross Lippert, and Russell Schwartz:
      SNPs Problems, Complexity, and Algorithms
      Proceedings ESA’01 This paper contributed to foundational work of understanding emerging problems in genetics through the computational lens. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are the most frequent form of human genetic variation. They are of fundamental importance in medical diagnostic, drug design, and are a fingerprint of disease genes. This work studied problems related to computational SNPs validation based on genome assemblies of diploid organisms (those with two copies of each chromosome) and presented both hardness results and efficient algorithms, using graph modeling.

ESA Locations and Links