Jorik Jooken (KU Leuven, Belgium): How can computers help in obtaining new results in graph theory?
This talk consists of two parts. In the first part, I will give an introduction to the domain of computer-assisted graph theory, which is concerned with developing algorithms in order to help researchers gain insights into various graph theoretical questions. In particular, I will discuss a broad range of popular techniques from this domain and briefly talk about their applications. In the second part, I will zoom in on an algorithm for exhaustively generating graphs and show how executing this algorithm leads to new insights in the domain of graph colouring.
This talk is based on two papers, available at https://arxiv.org/pdf/2508.20825 and https://arxiv.org/pdf/2404.11704.
Jorik Jooken is an FWO Postdoctoral Fellow at KU Leuven, working in the research group of Jan Goedgebeur. He earned his Ph.D. from KU Leuven in 2023, where he has been a postdoctoral researcher since his graduation. As of August 2026, he will join Leiden University in the Netherlands as an Assistant Professor.
Apart from his activities at KU Leuven, he has also spent several months in various universities abroad such as Comenius University (Slovakia), Nankai University (China), Western Sydney University (Australia) and Durham University (United Kingdom).
He is an expert in the field of discrete algorithms for combinatorial problems, with a particular emphasis on computer-assisted graph theory. He collaborates frequently with other mathematicians and computer scientists on various topics such as combinatorial optimization, extremal graph theory, graph coloring, long cycles in graphs, and enumeration of graphs. The topics of some of his latest publications include vertex-critical (P5,W4)-free graphs, (k,g)-graphs without (g+1)-cycles, girth and connectivity of cubic graphs with a unique longest cycle and a survey on computer-assisted graph theory.
He has been the advisor to three doctoral students and to numerous bachelor’s and master’s students.