This document discusses the minimum fill-in problem for sparse matrices. It begins with an introduction to fill-in that occurs during Gaussian elimination due to the introduction of new non-zero elements. It describes how the minimum fill-in problem is NP-hard and discusses various heuristics to minimize fill-in, including minimum degree ordering and nested dissection. The minimum degree algorithm works by repeatedly eliminating the vertex with minimum degree but does not always produce optimal orderings. The document provides examples to illustrate minimum degree and discusses enhancements like mass elimination to improve its performance.