NP-complete
<complexity> (NPC, Nondeterministic Polynomial time complete) A set or property of computational decision problems which is a subset of NP (i.e. can be solved by a nondeterministic Turing Machine in polynomial time), with the additional property that it is also NP-hard.
Thus a solution for one NP-complete problem would solve all problems in NP.
Many (but not all) naturally arising problems in class NP are in fact NP-complete.
There is always a polynomial-time algorithm for transforming an instance of any NP-complete problem into an instance of any other NP-complete problem.
So if you could solve one you could solve any other by transforming it to the solved one.
The first problem ever shown to be NP-complete was the satisfiability problem.
Another example is Hamilton's problem.
See also computational complexity, halting problem, Co-NP, NP-hard.
(http://fi-www.arc.nasa.gov/fia/projects/bayes-group/group/NP/).
[Other examples?]
| < Previous Terms | Terms Containing NP-complete | Next Terms > |
| NOWEB no-write allocation NP np NPC | AI-complete brute force complexity constraint satisfaction exponential-time algorithm | NP-hard NPL NPPL N-Prolog NP time |
