Node Centrality Approximation For Large Networks Based On Inductive Graph Neural Networks

Abstract

Closeness Centrality (CC) and Betweenness Centrality (BC) are crucial metrics in network analysis, providing essential reference for discerning the significance of nodes within complex networks. These measures find wide applications in critical tasks, such as community detection and network dismantling. However, their practical implementation on extensive networks remains computationally demanding due to their high time complexity. To mitigate these computational challenges, numerous approximation algorithms have been developed to expedite the computation of CC and BC. Nevertheless, even these approximations still necessitate substantial processing time when applied to large-scale networks. Furthermore, their output proves sensitive to even minor perturbations within the network structure. In this work, We redefine the CC and BC node ranking problem as a machine learning problem and propose the CNCA-IGE model, which is an encoder-decoder model based on inductive graph neural networks designed to rank nodes based on specified CC or BC metrics. We incorporate the MLP-Mixer model as the decoder in the BC ranking prediction task to enhance the model's robustness and capacity. Our approach is evaluated on diverse synthetic and real-world networks of varying scales, and the experimental results demonstrate that the CNCA-IGE model outperforms state-of-the-art baseline models, significantly reducing execution time while improving performance.