Minimizing the jump number for partially ordered sets: A graph-theoretic approach

The purpose of this paper is to present a graph-theoretic approach to the jump number problem for N-free posets which is based on the observation that the Hasse diagram of an N-free poset is a line digraph. Therefore, to every N-free poset P we can assign another digraph which is the root digraph of the Hasse diagram of P. Using this representation we show that the jump number of an N-free poset is equal to the cyclomatic number of its root digraph and can be found (without producing any linear extension) by an algorithm which tests if a given poset is N-free. Moreover, we demonstrate that there exists a correspondence between optimal linear extensions of an N-free poset and spanning branchings of its root digraph. We provide also another proof of the fact that optimal linear extensions of N-free posets are exactly greedy linear extensions. In conclusion, we discuss some possible generalizations of these results to arbitrary posets.     

Extending a Partially Ordered Set: Links with its Lattice of Ideals

A well-known result of Bonnet and Pouzet bijectively links the set of linear extensions of a partial order P with the set of maximal chains of its lattice of ideals I(P). We extend this result by showing that there is a one-to-one correspondence between the set of all extensions of P and the set of all sublattices of I(P) which are chain-maximal in the sense that every chain which is maximal (for inclusion) in the sublattice is also maximal in the lattice.We prove that the absence of order S as a convex suborder of P is equivalent to the absence of I(S) as a convex suborder of I(P). Let S be a set of partial orders and let us call S-convex-free any order that does not contain any order of S as a convex suborder. We deduce from the previous results that there is a one-to-one correspondence between the set of S-convex-free extensions of P and the set of I(S)-convex-free chain-maximal sublattices of I(P). This can be applied to some classical classes of orders (total orders and in the finite case, weak orders, interval orders, N-free orders). In the particular case of total orders this gives as a corollary the result of Bonnet and Pouzet.     

On the greedy dimension of a partial order

This paper introduces a new concept of dimension for partially ordered sets. Dushnik and Miller in 1941 introduced the concept of dimension of a partial order P, as the minimum cardinality of a realizer, (i.e., a set of linear extensions of P whose intersection is P). Every poset has a greedy realizer (i.e., a realizer consisting of greedy linear extensions). We begin the study of the notion of greedy dimension of a poset and its relationship with the usual dimension by proving that equality holds for a wide class of posets including N-free posets, two-dimensional posets and distributive lattices.     

Interval Reductions and Extensions of Orders: Bijections to Chains in Lattices

We discuss bijections that relate families of chains in lattices associated to an order P and families of interval orders defined on the ground set of P. Two bijections of this type have been known:(1) The bijection between maximal chains in the antichain lattice A(P) and the linear extensions of P.(2) The bijection between maximal chains in the lattice of maximal antichains A_M(P) and minimal interval extensions of P.We discuss two approaches to associate interval orders with chains in A(P). This leads to new bijections generalizing Bijections 1 and 2. As a consequence, we characterize the chains corresponding to weak-order extensions and minimal weak-order extensions of P.Seeking for a way of representing interval reductions of P by chains we came upon the separation lattice S(P). Chains in this lattice encode an interesting subclass of interval reductions of P. Let S_M(P) be the lattice of maximal separations in the separation lattice. Restricted to maximal separations, the above bijection specializes to a bijection which nicely complements 1 and 2.(3) A bijection between maximal chains in the lattice of maximal separations S_M(P) and minimal interval reductions of P.     

Line directionality of orders

Some orders can be represented by translating convex figures in the plane. It is proved thatN-free and interval orders admit such representations with an unbounded number of directions. Weak orders, tree-like orders and two-dimensional orders of height one are shown to be two- directional. In all cases line segments can be used as convex sets.     

On the number of k-realizations of an ordered set

A k-realization of an ordered set P is a sequence of k linear orderings of the underlying set of P, whose intersection is (the order relation of) P. We determine the status of the number of k-realizations with respect to comparability invariance, and we show that among all orders on the set {1, 2, ..., n}, the antichain has the most k-realizations, for any k>1. The latter intuitively reasonable result rests ultimately on an observation related to comparability invariance for numbers of linear extensions.Research supported by ONR Contract N00014 85-K-0769.     

Transitive closure for restricted classes of partial orders

Most papers dealing with partial orders assume that the input is given either in transitively closed or transitively reduced form. In this paper, we show that it is possible to solve some problems on partial orders in less time than it takes to perform transitive closure or reduction for general graphs. In particular, we present efficient algorithms for recognizing two dimensional partial orders and N-free partial orders when no assumptions are made about the form of the input.This work was supported by National Science Foundation Grant DCR-8604577 and the Vanderbilt University Research Council.     

Some aspects of (non) functoriality of natural discrete covers of locales

Abstract

The frame S_c(L) generated by closed sublocales of a locale L is known to be a natural Boolean (“discrete”) extension of a subfit L; also it is known to be its maximal essential extension. In this paper we first show that it is an essential extension of any L and that the maximal essential extensions of L and S_c(L) are isomorphic. The construction S_c is not functorial; this leads to the question of individual liftings of homomorphisms L → M to homomorphisms S_c(L) → S_c(M). This is trivial for Boolean L and easy for a wide class of spatial L, M . Then, we show that one can lift all h : L → 2 for weakly Hausdor? L (and hence the spectra of L and S_c(L) are naturally isomorphic), and finally present liftings of h : L → M for regular L and arbitrary Boolean M.     

Simplicial elimination schemes,extremal lattices and maximal antichain lattices

Fix a partial order P=(X, <). We first show that bipartite orders are sufficient to study structural properties of the lattice of maximal antichains. We show that all orders having the same lattice of maximal antichains can be reduced to one representative order (called the poset of irreducibles by Markowsky [14]). We then define the strong simplicial elimination scheme to characterize orders which have distributive lattice of maximal antichains. The notion of simplicial elimination corresponds to the decomposition process described in [14] for extremal lattices. This notion leads to simple greedy algorithms for distributivity checking, lattice recognition and jump number computation. In the last section, we give several algorithms for lattices and orders.     

On the Fixed Point Property for (3 + 1)-Free Ordered Sets

We prove that if a finite (3 + 1)-free ordered set of height two has the fixed point property, then it is dismantlable by irreducibles. We provide an example of a finite (3 + 1)-free ordered set of height three with the fixed point property and no irreducible elements. We characterize the minimal automorphic ordered sets which are respectively (3 + 1)-free, (2 + 2)-free and N-free.     

On trees and tree dimension of ordered sets

We call an ordered set (X, ) a tree if no pair of incomparable elements ofX has an upper bound. It is shown that there is a natural way to associate a tree (T, ) with any ordered set (X, ), and (T, ) can be characterized by a universal property. We define the tree dimensiontd(X, ) of an ordered set as the minimal number of extensions of (X, ) which are trees such that the given order is the intersection of those tree orders. We give characterizations of the tree dimension, relations between dimension and tree dimension, and removal theorems.     

The Menger property for infinite ordered sets

It is shown that, if an ordered set P contains at most k pairwise disjoint maximal chains, where k is finite, then every finite family of maximal chains in P has a cutset of size at most k. As a corollary of this, we obtain the following Menger-type result that, if in addition, P contains k pairwise disjoint complete maximal chains, then the whole family, M (P), of maximal chains in P has a cutset of size k. We also give a direct proof of this result. We give an example of an ordered set P in which every maximal chain is complete, P does not contain infinitely many pairwise disjoint maximal chains (but arbitrarily large finite families of pairwise disjoint maximal chains), and yet M (P) does not have a cutset of size <x, where x is any given (infinite) cardinal. This shows that the finiteness of k in the above corollary is essential and disproves a conjecture of Zaguia.     

Height Preserving Minimal Interval Extensions

We consider minimal interval extensions of a partial order which preserve the height of each vertex. We show that minimal interval extensions having this property bijectively correspond to the maximal chains of a sublattice of the lattice of maximal antichains of the given order. We show that they also correspond to the set of minimal interval extensions of a certain extension of this order.     

Towards the reconstruction of posets

The reconstruction conjecture for posets is the following: Every finite posetP of more than three elements is uniquely determined — up to isomorphism — by its collection of (unlabelled) one-element-deleted subposets P–{x}:xV(P).We show that disconnected posets, posets with a least (respectively, greatest) element, series decomposable posets, series-parallel posets and interval orders are reconstructible and that N-free orders are recognizable.We show that the following parameters are reconstructible: the number of minimal (respectively, maximal) elements, the level-structure, the ideal-size sequence of the maximal elements, the ideal-size (respectively, filter-size) sequence of any fixed level of the HASSE-diagram and the number of edges of the HASSE-diagram.This is considered to be a first step towards a proof of the reconstruction conjecture for posets.Research partly supported by DAAD.     

The automorphism group of a function lattice: A problem of Jónsson and McKenzie

It is shown that Aut(L ^Q ) is naturally isomorphic to Aut(L) × Aut(Q) whenL is a directly and exponentially indecomposable lattice,Q a non-empty connected poset, and one of the following holds:Q is arbitrary butL is ajm-lattice,Q is finitely factorable and L is complete with a join-dense subset of completely join-irreducible elements, orL is arbitrary butQ is finite. A problem of Jónsson and McKenzie is thereby solved. Sharp conditions are found guaranteeing the injectivity of the natural mapv _P,Q from Aut(P) × Aut(Q) to Aut(P ^Q )P andQ posets), correcting misstatements made by previous authors. It is proven that, for a bounded posetP and arbitraryQ, the Dedekind-MacNeille completion ofP ^Q ,DM(P ^Q ), is isomorphic toDM(P)^Q. This isomorphism is used to prove that the natural mapv _P,Q is an isomorphism ifv _DM(P),Q is, reducing a poset problem to a more tractable lattice problem.Presented by B. Jonsson.The author would like to thank his supervisor, Dr. H. A. Priestley, for her direction and advice as well as his undergraduate supervisor, Prof. Garrett Birkhoff, and Dr. P. M. Neumann for comments regarding the paper. This material is based upon work supported under a (U.S.) National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and a Marshall Aid Commemoration Commission Scholarship.     

On Minimal Extensions of Rings

Given two rings R ? S, S is said to be a minimal ring extension of R, if R is a maximal subring of S. In this article, we study minimal extensions of an arbitrary ring R, with particular focus on those possessing nonzero ideals that intersect R trivially. We will also classify the minimal ring extensions of prime rings, generalizing results of Dobbs, Dobbs &; Shapiro, and Ferrand &; Olivier, on commutative minimal extensions.     

A 3/2-approximation algorithm for the jump number of interval orders

The jump number of a partial order P is the minimum number of incomparable adjacent pairs in some linear extension of P. The jump number problem is known to be NP-hard in general. However some particular classes of posets admit easy calculation of the jump number.The complexity status for interval orders still remains unknown. Here we present a heuristic that, given an interval order P, generates a linear extension , whose jump number is less than 3/2 times the jump number of P.This work was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).     

Angle orders

A finite poset is an angle order if its points can be mapped into angular regions in the plane so thatx precedesy in the poset precisely when the region forx is properly included in the region fory. We show that all posets of dimension four or less are angle orders, all interval orders are angle orders, and that some angle orders must have an angular region less than 180° (or more than 180°). The latter result is used to prove that there are posets that are not angle orders.The smallest verified poset that is not an angle order has 198 points. We suspect that the minimum is around 30 points. Other open problems are noted, including whether there are dimension-5 posets that are not angle orders.Research supported in part by the National Science Foundation, grant number DMS-8401281.     

Angle orders,regular n-gon orders and the crossing number

A finite poset P(X,<) on a set X={ x ₁,...,x _m} is an angle order (regular n-gon order) if the elements of P(X,<) can be mapped into a family of angular regions on the plane (a family of regular polygons with n sides and having parallel sides) such that x _ij if and only if the angular region (regular n-gon) for x _i is contained in the region (regular n-gon) for x _j. In this paper we prove that there are partial orders of dimension 6 with 64 elements which are not angle orders. The smallest partial order previously known not to be an angle order has 198 elements and has dimension 7. We also prove that partial orders of dimension 3 are representable using equilateral triangles with the same orientation. This results does not generalizes to higher dimensions. We will prove that there is a partial order of dimension 4 with 14 elements which is not a regular n-gon order regardless of the value of n. Finally, we prove that partial orders of dimension 3 are regular n-gon orders for n3.This research was supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, grant numbers A0977 and A2415.     

When Will Every Maximal <Emphasis Type="BoldItalic">F</Emphasis>-free Subposet Contain a Maximal Element?

Let F be a partially ordered set (poset). A poset P is called F-free if P contains no subposet isomorphic to F. A finite poset F is said to have the maximal element property if every maximal F-free subposet of any finite poset P contains a maximal element of P. It is shown that a poset F with at least two elements has the maximal element property if and only if F is an antichain or F ≅ 2 + 2.