Extended MSO Model Checking via Small Vertex Integrity

Abstract: We study the model checking problem of an extended $\mathsf{MSO}$ with local and global cardinality constraints, called $\mathsf{MSO}^{\mathsf{GL}}_{\mathsf{Lin}}$, introduced recently by Knop, Kouteck\'{y}, Masa\v{r}\'{i}k, and Toufar [Log. Methods Comput. Sci., 15(4), 2019]. We show that the problem is fixed-parameter tractable parameterized by vertex integrity, where vertex integrity is a graph parameter standing between vertex cover number and treedepth. Our result thus narrows the gap between the fixed-parameter tractability parameterized by vertex cover number and the W[1]-hardness parameterized by treedepth.