Darren Strash

Darren Strash’s research focuses on how to solve computationally difficult graph problems in practice. Such problems include computing cohesive subgraphs (such as cliques and k-plexes), independent sets, cuts, and covers. To solve these problems, Strash brings together techniques from algorithm theory, combinatorial optimization, and operations research. His additional areas of expertise include computational geometry, graph drawing, and dynamic data structures.

Before coming to Hamilton, Strash was a visiting assistant professor at Colgate University. Before Colgate, he spent two years in Germany as a postdoctoral researcher at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology’s Institute of Theoretical Informatics. Strash worked for three years as a software engineer at Intel.

In his free time, he enjoys playing strategic board games, reading sci-fi and fantasy novels, and contributing to openstreetmap.org. Strash earned his bachelor’s in computer science from Cal Poly Pomona and his doctorate from the University of California, Irvine.

Recent Courses Taught

Design Principles
Algorithms and Data Structures
Computational Geometry
Algorithms
Senior Seminar

Select Publications

• A. Hevia ’24, B. Kallus ’21, S. McClintic ’24, S. Reisner ’24, D. Strash, J. Wilson ’24, “Solving Edge Clique Cover Exactly via Synergistic Data Reduction,” 31st Annual European Symposium on Algorithms (ESA 2023), 2023, pp. 61:1–61:19,  doi:10.4230/LIPIcs.ESA.2023.61.
• F. Abu-Khzam, S. Lamm, M. Mnich, A. Noe, C. Schulz, D. Strash, “Recent Advances in Practical Data Reduction,” Algorithms for Big Data, 2022, Springer, 97–133, doi:10.1007/978-3-031-21534-6_6.
• D. Strash, L. Thompson ’21, “Effective Data Reduction for the Vertex Clique Cover Problem,” Proc. 29th SIAM Symposium on Algorithm Engineering and Experiments (ALENEX 2022), SIAM, 2022, pp. 41–53, doi:10.1137/1.9781611977042.4.
• D. Hespe, C. Schulz, and D. Strash, “Scalable Kernelization for Maximum Independent Sets,” ACM Journal of Experimental Algorithmics, 22: 1.16, 2019, doi:10.1145/3355502.
• D. Funke, S. Lamm, U. Meyer, M. Penschuck, C. Schulz, P. Sanders, D. Strash, M. von Looz, “Communication-free Massively Distributed Graph Generation,” Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing, 131, 2019, pp. 200–217, doi:10.1016/j.jpdc.2019.03.011.

Appointed to the Faculty

Educational Background

Ph.D., University of California, Irvine
M.S., University of California, Irvine
B.S., Cal Poly Pomona