What are trees?

 Tree is a hierarchical data structure which stores the information naturally in

the form of hierarchy style.
 Tree is one of the most powerful and advanced data structures.
 It is a non-linear data structure compared to arrays, linked lists, stack and
queue.
 It represents the nodes connected by edges.

Tree is a collection of elements called Nodes, where each node can have arbitrary
number of children.

Field Description
Root is a special node in a tree. The entire tree is referenced through
Root
it. It does not have a parent.
Parent Node Parent node is an immediate predecessor of a node.
Child Node All immediate successors of a node are its children.
Siblings Nodes with the same parent are called Siblings.
Path is a number of successive edges from source node to destination
Path
node.
Height of Height of a node represents the number of edges on the longest path
Node between that node and a leaf.
Height of
Height of tree represents the height of its root node.
Tree
Depth of Depth of a node represents the number of edges from the tree's root
Node node to the node.
Degree of
Degree of a node represents a number of children of a node.
Node
Edge is a connection between one node to another. It is a line between
Edge
two nodes or a node and a leaf.

In the above figure, D, F, H, G are leaves. B and C are siblings. Each node
excluding a root is connected by a direct edge from exactly one other node
parent → children.

Levels of a node
Levels of a node represents the number of connections between the node and the
root. It represents generation of a node. If the root node is at level 0, its next node
is at level 1, its grand child is at level 2 and so on. Levels of a node can be shown
as follows:

Note:

- If node has no children, it is called Leaves or External Nodes.

- Nodes which are not leaves, are called Internal Nodes. Internal nodes have at
least one child.

- A tree can be empty with no nodes or a tree consists of one node called the Root.

Applications of Trees

Trees and their variants are an extremely useful data structure with lots of practical
applications.

 Binary Search Trees(BSTs) are used to quickly check whether an element is

present in a set or not.
 Heap is a kind of tree that is used for heap sort.
 A modified version of tree called Tries is used in modern routers to store
routing information.
 Most popular databases use B-Trees and T-Trees, which are variants of the
tree structure we learned above to store their data
 Compilers use a syntax tree to validate the syntax of every program you
write.

The important properties of tree data structure are-

 There is one and only one path between every pair of vertices in a tree.
 A tree with n vertices has exactly (n-1) edges.
 A graph is a tree if and only if it is minimally connected.
 Any connected graph with n vertices and (n-1) edges is a tree.

Tree Terminology-

The important terms related to tree data structure are-

1. Root-

 The first node from where the tree originates is called as a root node.
 In any tree, there must be only one root node.
 We can never have multiple root nodes in a tree data structure.

Example-
Here, node A is the only root node.

2. Edge-

 The connecting link between any two nodes is called as an edge.

 In a tree with n number of nodes, there are exactly (n-1) number of edges.

Example-
3. Parent-

 The node which has a branch from it to any other node is called as a parent
node.
 In other words, the node which has one or more children is called as a parent
node.
 In a tree, a parent node can have any number of child nodes.

Example-
Here,

 Node A is the parent of nodes B and C

 Node B is the parent of nodes D, E and F
 Node C is the parent of nodes G and H
 Node E is the parent of nodes I and J
 Node G is the parent of node K

4. Child-

 The node which is a descendant of some node is called as a child node.

 All the nodes except root node are child nodes.

Example-
Here,

 Nodes B and C are the children of node A

 Nodes D, E and F are the children of node B
 Nodes G and H are the children of node C
 Nodes I and J are the children of node E
 Node K is the child of node G

5. Siblings-

 Nodes which belong to the same parent are called as siblings.

 In other words, nodes with the same parent are sibling nodes.

Example-
Here,

 Nodes B and C are siblings

 Nodes D, E and F are siblings
 Nodes G and H are siblings
 Nodes I and J are siblings

6. Degree-

 Degree of a node is the total number of children of that node.

 Degree of a tree is the highest degree of a node among all the nodes in the
tree.
Example-

Here,

 Degree of node A = 2
 Degree of node B = 3
 Degree of node C = 2
 Degree of node D = 0
 Degree of node E = 2
 Degree of node F = 0
 Degree of node G = 1
 Degree of node H = 0
 Degree of node I = 0
 Degree of node J = 0
 Degree of node K = 0

7. Internal Node-

 The node which has at least one child is called as an internal node.
  Internal nodes are also called as non-terminal nodes.
 Every non-leaf node is an internal node.

Example-

Here, nodes A, B, C, E and G are internal nodes.

8. Leaf Node-

 The node which does not have any child is called as a leaf node.
 Leaf nodes are also called as external nodes or terminal nodes.

Example-
Here, nodes D, I, J, F, K and H are leaf nodes.

9. Level-

 In a tree, each step from top to bottom is called as level of a tree.

 The level count starts with 0 and increments by 1 at each level or step.

Example-
10. Height-

 Total number of edges that lies on the longest path from any leaf node to a
particular node is called as height of that node.
 Height of a tree is the height of root node.
 Height of all leaf nodes = 0

Example-
Here,

 Height of node A = 3
 Height of node B = 2
 Height of node C = 2
 Height of node D = 0
 Height of node E = 1
 Height of node F = 0
 Height of node G = 1
 Height of node H = 0
 Height of node I = 0
 Height of node J = 0
 Height of node K = 0

11. Depth-

 Total number of edges from root node to a particular node is called as depth
of that node.
 Depth of a tree is the total number of edges from root node to a leaf node in
the longest path.
 Depth of the root node = 0
  The terms “level” and “depth” are used interchangeably.

Example-

Here,

 Depth of node A = 0
 Depth of node B = 1
 Depth of node C = 1
 Depth of node D = 2
 Depth of node E = 2
 Depth of node F = 2
 Depth of node G = 2
 Depth of node H = 2
 Depth of node I = 3
 Depth of node J = 3
 Depth of node K = 3

12. Subtree-
  In a tree, each child from a node forms a subtree recursively.
 Every child node forms a subtree on its parent node.

Example-

13. Forest-

A forest is a set of disjoint trees.

Example-
Expression Tree

Expression trees are used to evaluate the simple arithmetic expressions. Expression
tree is basically a binary tree where internal nodes are represented by operators
while the leaf nodes are represented by operands. Expression trees are widely used
to solve algebraic expressions like (a+b)*(a-b). Consider the following example.

Q. Construct an expression tree by using the following algebraic expression.

(a + b) / (a*b - c) + d
Binary Tree-

Binary tree is a special tree data structure in which each node can have at most
2 children.

Thus, in a binary tree,

Each node has either 0 child or 1 child or 2 children.

Example-

Unlabeled Binary Tree-

A binary tree is unlabeled if its nodes are not assigned any label.
Example-

Consider we want to draw all the binary trees possible with 3 unlabeled nodes.

Using the above formula, we have-

Number of binary trees possible with 3 unlabeled nodes

= 2 x 3C3 / (3 + 1)

= 6C3 / 4

=5

Thus,
  With 3 unlabeled nodes, 5 unlabeled binary trees are possible.
 These unlabeled binary trees are as follows-

Labeled Binary Tree-

A binary tree is labeled if all its nodes are assigned a label.

Example-

Consider we want to draw all the binary trees possible with 3 labeled nodes.

Using the above formula, we have-

Number of binary trees possible with 3 labeled nodes

= { 2 x 3C3 / (3 + 1) } x 3!

= { 6C3 / 4 } x 6

=5x6

= 30

Thus,

 With 3 labeled nodes, 30 labeled binary trees are possible.

 Each unlabeled structure gives rise to 3! = 6 different labeled structures.
Similarly,

 Every other unlabeled structure gives rise to 6 different labeled structures.

 Thus, in total 30 different labeled binary trees are possible.

Types of Binary Trees-

Binary trees can be of the following types-

 1. Rooted Binary Tree
2. Full / Strictly Binary Tree
3. Complete / Perfect Binary Tree
4. Almost Complete Binary Tree
5. Skewed Binary Tree

1. Rooted Binary Tree-

A rooted binary tree is a binary tree that satisfies the following 2 properties-

 It has a root node.

 Each node has at most 2 children.
Example-

2. Full / Strictly Binary Tree-

 A binary tree in which every node has either 0 or 2 children is called as a

Full binary tree.
 Full binary tree is also called as Strictly binary tree.

Example-
Here,

 First binary tree is not a full binary tree.

 This is because node C has only 1 child.

3. Complete / Perfect Binary Tree-

A complete binary tree is a binary tree that satisfies the following 2 properties-

 Every internal node has exactly 2 children.

 All the leaf nodes are at the same level.

Complete binary tree is also called as Perfect binary tree.

Example-

Here,

 First binary tree is not a complete binary tree.

 This is because all the leaf nodes are not at the same level.

4. Almost Complete Binary Tree-

An almost complete binary tree is a binary tree that satisfies the following 2
properties-

 All the levels are completely filled except possibly the last level.
 The last level must be strictly filled from left to right.
Example-

Here,

 First binary tree is not an almost complete binary tree.

 This is because the last level is not filled from left to right.

5. Skewed Binary Tree-

A skewed binary tree is a binary tree that satisfies the following 2 properties-

 All the nodes except one node has one and only one child.
 The remaining node has no child.

OR

A skewed binary tree is a binary tree of n nodes such that its depth is (n-1).
Example-

Binary Tree Properties-

Important properties of binary trees are-

Property-01:

Minimum number of nodes in a binary tree of height H

=H+1

Example-
To construct a binary tree of height = 4, we need at least 4 + 1 = 5 nodes.

Property-02:

Maximum number of nodes in a binary tree of height H

= 2H+1 – 1

Example-

Maximum number of nodes in a binary tree of height 3

= 23+1 – 1

= 16 – 1
= 15 nodes

Thus, in a binary tree of height = 3, maximum number of nodes that can be

inserted = 15.

We can not insert more number of nodes in this binary tree.

Property-03:

Total Number of leaf nodes in a Binary Tree

= Total Number of nodes with 2 children + 1

Example-
Consider the following binary tree-

Here,

 Number of leaf nodes = 3

 Number of nodes with 2 children = 2

Clearly, number of leaf nodes is one greater than number of nodes with 2 children.

This verifies the above relation.

NOTE

It is interesting to note that-

Number of leaf nodes in any binary tree depends only on the number of nodes
with 2 children.
Property-04:

Maximum number of nodes at any level ‘L’ in a binary tree

= 2L

Example-

Maximum number of nodes at level-2 in a binary tree

= 22

=4

Thus, in a binary tree, maximum number of nodes that can be present at level-2 =
4.

To gain better understanding about Binary Tree Properties,

PRACTICE PROBLEMS BASED ON BINARY TREE PROPERTIES-

Problem-01:

A binary tree T has n leaf nodes. The number of nodes of degree-2 in T is ______?

A. log2n
B. n-1
C. n
D. 2n

Solution-

Using property-3, we have-

Number of degree-2 nodes

= Number of leaf nodes – 1

=n–1

Thus, Option (B) is correct.

Problem-02:

In a binary tree, for every node the difference between the number of nodes in the
left and right subtrees is at most 2. If the height of the tree is h > 0, then the
minimum number of nodes in the tree is ______?
 A. 2h-1
B. 2h-1 + 1
C. 2h – 1
D. 2h

Solution-

Let us assume any random value of h. Let h = 3.

Then the given options reduce to-

A. 4
B. 5
C. 7
D. 8

Now, consider the following binary tree with height h = 3-

 This binary tree satisfies the question constraints.

 It is constructed using minimum number of nodes.
Thus, Option (B) is correct.

Problem-03:

In a binary tree, the number of internal nodes of degree-1 is 5 and the number of
internal nodes of degree-2 is 10. The number of leaf nodes in the binary tree is
______?

A. 10
B. 11
C. 12
D. 15

Solution-

Using property-3, we have-

Number of leaf nodes in a binary tree

= Number of degree-2 nodes + 1

= 10 + 1

= 11

Thus, Option (B) is correct.

Problem-04:
The height of a binary tree is the maximum number of edges in any root to leaf
path. The maximum number of nodes in a binary tree of height h is ______?

A. 2h
B. 2h-1 – 1
C. 2h+1 – 1
D. 2h+1

Solution-

Using property-2, Option (C) is correct.

Problem-05:

A binary tree T has 20 leaves. The number of nodes in T having 2 children is

______?

Solution-

Using property-3, correct answer is 19.

Tree Traversal-

Tree Traversal refers to the process of visiting each node in a tree data
structure exactly once.
Various tree traversal techniques are-

Depth First Traversal-

Following three traversal techniques fall under Depth First Traversal-

1. Preorder Traversal
2. Inorder Traversal
3. Postorder Traversal

1. Preorder Traversal-

Algorithm-
 1. Visit the root
2. Traverse the left sub tree i.e. call Preorder (left sub tree)
3. Traverse the right sub tree i.e. call Preorder (right sub tree)

Root → Left → Right

Example-

Consider the following example-

Preorder Traversal Shortcut

Traverse the entire tree starting from the root node keeping yourself to the left.
Applications-

 Preorder traversal is used to get prefix expression of an expression tree.

 Preorder traversal is used to create a copy of the tree.

2. Inorder Traversal-

Algorithm-

1. Traverse the left sub tree i.e. call Inorder (left sub tree)
2. Visit the root
3. Traverse the right sub tree i.e. call Inorder (right sub tree)
 Left → Root → Right

Example-

Consider the following example-

Inorder Traversal Shortcut

Keep a plane mirror horizontally at the bottom of the tree and take the
projection of all the nodes.
Application-

 Inorder traversal is used to get infix expression of an expression tree.

3. Postorder Traversal-

Algorithm-

1. Traverse the left sub tree i.e. call Postorder (left sub tree)
2. Traverse the right sub tree i.e. call Postorder (right sub tree)
 3. Visit the root

Left → Right → Root

Example-

Consider the following example-

Postorder Traversal Shortcut

Pluck all the leftmost leaf nodes one by one.

Applications-

 Postorder traversal is used to get postfix expression of an expression tree.

 Postorder traversal is used to delete the tree.
 This is because it deletes the children first and then it deletes the parent.

Breadth First Traversal-

 Breadth First Traversal of a tree prints all the nodes of a tree level by level.
 Breadth First Traversal is also called as Level Order Traversal.

Example-
Application-

 Level order traversal is used to print the data in the same order as stored in
the array representation of a complete binary tree.