Использование матриц смежности для визуализации больших графов

Abstract

Exponential size growth of such graphs as social networks, Internet graphs, etc. requires new approaches to their visualization. Along with node-link diagram representations, adjacency matrices and various hybrid representations are increasingly used for large graphs visualizations. This survey discusses new approaches to the visualization of large graphs using adjacency matrices and gives examples of applications where these approaches are used. We describe various types of patterns arising when adjacency matrices corresponding to modern networks are ordered, and algorithms making it possible to reveal these patterns. In particular, the use of matrix ordering methods in conjunction with algorithms looking for such graph patterns as stars, false stars, chains, near-cliques, full cliques, bipartite cores and near-bipartite cores enable users to create understandable visualizations of graphs with millions of vertices and edges. Examples of hybrid visualizations using node-link diagrams for representing sparse parts of a graph and adjacency matrices for representing dense parts are also given. The hybrid methods are used to visualize co-authorship networks, deep neural networks, to compare networks of the human brain connectivity, etc.