Line Graph is the Key: An Exploration of Line Graph on Link Prediction with Social Networks

Network data plays a crucial role in various real-world applications, as connections between entities can be represented and analyzed through graphs. These include various types, such as social, information, and technical networks. However, the complex topologies of these networks present challenges in converting graph data into machine-readable vector formats. Existing models, such as Graph Neural Networks, Graph Attention Networks, and node2vec, have made strides in graph embeddings. For edge-related tasks, models such as node2vec typically use indirect methods like concatenating node vectors to represent edges. This approach is useful for tasks like link prediction. In this paper, we present LineDi2vec, a novel approach that improves the Node2vec embedding method by utilizing a line graph. The proposed LineDi2vec not only generalizes the original graphs, transforming the relationships between edges and nodes but also maintains the original graphs' topological integrity for effective node embedding by Node2vec. We evaluated LineDi2vec on four real-world datasets, focusing on link prediction. The results demonstrate that LineDi2vec outperforms traditional node concatenation methods.