A second look at counting triangles in graph streams (vol 552, pg 44, 2014)

In this paper we present improved results on the problem of counting triangles in edge streamed graphs. For graphs with m edges and at least T triangles, we show that an extra look over the stream yields a two-pass streaming algorithm that uses O(mε2.5Tpolylog(m)) space and outputs a (1+ε) approximation of the number of triangles in the graph. This improves upon the two-pass streaming tester of Braverman, Ostrovsky and Vilenchik, ICALP 2013, which distinguishes between triangle-free graphs and graphs with at least T triangle using O(mT1/3) space. Also, in terms of dependence on T, we show that more passes would not lead to a better space bound. In other words, we prove there is no constant pass streaming algorithm that distinguishes between triangle-free graphs from graphs with at least T triangles using O(mT1/2+ρ) space for any constant ρ≥0.