Computing the second and third systoles of a combinatorial surface

Abstract: Given a weighted, undirected graph $G$ cellularly embedded on a topological surface $S$, we describe algorithms to compute the second shortest and third shortest closed walks of $G$ that are homotopically non-trivial in $S$. Our algorithms run in $O(n^2\log n)$ time for the second shortest walk and in $O(n^3)$ time for the third shortest walk. We also show how to reduce the running time for the second shortest homotopically non-trivial closed walk to $O(n\log n)$ when both the genus and the number of boundaries are fixed. Our algorithms rely on a careful analysis of the configurations of the first three shortest homotopically non-trivial curves in $S$. As an intermediate step, we also describe how to compute a shortest essential arc between \emph{one} pair of vertices or between \emph{all} pairs of vertices of a given boundary component of $S$ in $O(n^2)$ time or $O(n^3)$ time, respectively.