Recent characterization [9] of those graphs for which coloured MSO2 model checking is fast raised the interest in the graph invariant called tree-depth. Looking for a similar characterization for (coloured) MSO1, we introduce the notion of shrub-depth of a graph class. To prove that MSO1 model checking is fast for classes of bounded shrub-depth, we show that shrub-depth exactly characterizes the graph classes having interpretation in coloured trees of bounded height. We also introduce a common extension of cographs and of graphs with bounded shrubdepth-m-partite cographs (still of bounded clique-width), which are well quasi-ordered by the relation "is an induced subgraph of" and therefore allow polynomial time testing of hereditary properties.

a b s t r a c tRank-width is a structural graph measure introduced by Oum and Seymour and aimed at better handling of graphs of bounded clique-width. We propose a formal mathematical framework and tools for easy design of dynamic algorithms running directly on a rankdecomposition of a graph (on contrary to the usual approach which translates a rankdecomposition into a clique-width expression, with a possible exponential jump in the parameter). The main advantage of this framework is a fine control over the runtime dependency on the rank-width parameter. Our new approach is linked to a work of Courcelle and Kanté [7] who first proposed algebraic expressions with a so-called bilinear graph product as a better way of handling rank-decompositions, and to a parallel recent research of Bui-Xuan, Telle and Vatshelle.

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We study the problem of checking whether an existential sentence (that is, a first-order sentence in prefix form built using existential quantifiers and all Boolean connectives) is true in a finite partially ordered set (in short, a poset). A poset is a reflexive, antisymmetric, and transitive digraph. The problem encompasses the fundamental embedding problem of finding an isomorphic copy of a poset as an induced substructure of another poset.Model checking existential logic is already NP-hard on a fixed poset; thus we investigate structural properties of posets yielding conditions for fixed-parameter tractability when the problem is parameterized by the sentence. We identify width as a central structural property (the width of a poset is the maximum size of a subset of pairwise incomparable elements); our main algorithmic result is that model checking existential logic on classes of finite posets of bounded width is fixedparameter tractable. We observe a similar phenomenon in classical complexity, where we prove that the isomorphism problem is polynomial-time tractable on classes of posets of bounded width; this settles an open problem in order theory.We surround our main algorithmic result with complexity results on less restricted, natural neighboring classes of finite posets, establishing its tightness in this sense. We also relate our work with (and demonstrate its independence of) fundamental fixed-parameter tractability results for model checking on digraphs of bounded degree and bounded clique-width.