# 373. Find K Pairs with Smallest Sums ###### tags: `leetcode` ## Description You are given two integer arrays nums1 and nums2 sorted in ascending order and an integer k. Define a pair (u, v) which consists of one element from the first array and one element from the second array. Return the k pairs (u1, v1), (u2, v2), ..., (uk, vk) with the smallest sums. - Example 1: >Input: nums1 = [1,7,11], nums2 = [2,4,6], k = 3 Output: [[1,2],[1,4],[1,6]] >>Explanation: The first 3 pairs are returned from the sequence: [1,2],[1,4],[1,6],[7,2],[7,4],[11,2],[7,6],[11,4],[11,6] - Example 2: >Input: nums1 = [1,1,2], nums2 = [1,2,3], k = 2 Output: [[1,1],[1,1]] >>Explanation: The first 2 pairs are returned from the sequence: [1,1],[1,1],[1,2],[2,1],[1,2],[2,2],[1,3],[1,3],[2,3] - Example 3: >Input: nums1 = [1,2], nums2 = [3], k = 3 Output: [[1,3],[2,3]] >>Explanation: All possible pairs are returned from the sequence: [1,3],[2,3] - Constraints: >1 <= nums1.length, nums2.length <= 105 -109 <= nums1[i], nums2[i] <= 109 nums1 and nums2 both are sorted in ascending order. 1 <= k <= 104 ## Solution - For the problem, we can use heap to help solve the order. The structure for the input should start from the most important one ```cpp= priority_queue<vector<int>> q; q.push({-nums1[0] - nums2[0], 0, 0}); ``` - Because we need to remember which value is inserted, we also need to store the set that has already been finished ```cpp= set<pair<int, int>> visited; visited.insert({0, 0}); ``` - The key structure for the solution iss as follow - We use the priority queue to store the possible solution - Each time when popping out one optimal pair, store it into the answer and check the two proximities for the one - If the two proximities do not touch the end, add them into the queue and mark as visited ```cpp= while (!q.empty() && k--) { auto it = q.top(); q.pop(); ans.push_back({nums1[it[1]], nums2[it[2]]}); if (it[1] + 1 < nums1.size() && visited.count({it[1] + 1, it[2]}) == 0) { q.push({-nums1[it[1] + 1] - nums2[it[2]], it[1] + 1, it[2]}); visited.insert({it[1] + 1, it[2]}); } if (it[2] + 1 < nums2.size() && visited.count({it[1], it[2] + 1}) == 0) { q.push({-nums1[it[1]] - nums2[it[2] + 1], it[1], it[2] + 1}); visited.insert({it[1], it[2] + 1}); } } ```