Asymptotic bounds for the number of convex n-ominoes

Unit squares having their vertices at integer points in the Cartesian plane are called cells. A point set equal to a union of n distinct cells which is connected and has no finite cut set is called an n-omino. Two n-ominoes are considered the same if one is mapped onto the other by some translation of the plane. An n-omino is convex if all cells in a row or column form a connected strip. Letting c(n) denote the number of different convex n-ominoes, we show that the sequence ((c(n))¹ⁿ: n=1,2,…) tends to a limit γ and γ=2.309138….     

Polynomial recognition of equal unions in hypergraphs with few vertices of large degree

A family of nonempty sets has the equal union property if there exist two nonempty disjoint subfamilies having equal unions. If every point belongs to the unions, then we say the family has the full equal union property. Recognition of both properties is NP-complete even when restricted to families for which the degree of every point is at most three. In this paper we show that both recognition problems can be solved in polynomial time for families in which there is a bound on the number of points whose degree exceeds two.     

Complexity of Recognizing Equal Unions in Families of Sets

A family of sets has the equal union property if there exist two nonempty disjoint subfamilies having equal unions and has the full equal union property if, in addition, all sets are included. Both recognition problems are NP-complete even when restricted to families for which the cardinality of every set is at most three. Both problems can be solved in polynomial time when restricted to families having a bounded number of sets with cardinality greater than two. A corollary is that deciding if a graph has two disjoint edge covers is in P.     

Large tactical configurations

It is shown that if r = 2, then for all m, n, h ≥ 3 and all “large enough” R, W such that mR = nW, there is a tactical configuration of rank 2 girth g = 2h, and degrees m and n on sets of cardinalities R and W. We also show that if r ≥ 3 then for all h and all compatible degree sets N = {n(i, j)≥3} and all large enough numbers R(1), R(2),…, R(r) satisfying R(i)n(i, j) = R(j)n(j, i) there is a tactical configuration of rank r, girth h, and degrees N on set with cardinalities R(1), R(2),…, R(r).     

A degree sum condition for graphs to be prism hamiltonian

Win, in 1975, and Jackson and Wormald, in 1990, found the best sufficient conditions on the degree sum of a graph to guarantee the properties of “having a k-tree” and “having a k-walk”, respectively. The property of “being prism hamiltonian” is an intermediate property between “having a 2-tree” and “having a 2-walk”. Thus, it is natural to ask what is the best degree sum condition for graphs to be prism hamiltonian. As an answer to this problem, in this paper, we show that a connected graph G of order n with σ₃(G)≥n is prism hamiltonian. The degree sum condition “σ₃(G)≥n” is best possible.     

Existence of weakly pandiagonal orthogonal Latin squares

A weakly pandiagonal Latin square of order n over the number set {0, 1, . . . , n-1} is a Latin square having the property that the sum of the n numbers in each of 2n diagonals is the same. In this paper, we shall prove that a pair of orthogonal weakly pandiagonal Latin squares of order n exists if and only if n ≡ 0, 1, 3 (mod 4) and n≠3.     

A short and unified proof of Yu et al.?s two results on the eccentric distance sum

The eccentric distance sum (EDS) is a novel topological index that offers a vast potential for structure activity/property relationships. For a connected graph G, the eccentric distance sum is defined as ξd(G)=_∑v∈V(G)ecG(v)DG(v), where ecG(v) is the eccentricity of a vertex v in G and DG(v) is the sum of distances of all vertices in G from v. More recently, Yu et al. [G. Yu, L. Feng, A. Ili?, On the eccentric distance sum of trees and unicyclic graphs, J. Math. Anal. Appl. 375 (2011) 99-107] proved that for an n-vertex tree T, ξd(T)?4n²−9n+5, with equality holding if and only if T is the n-vertex star Sn, and for an n-vertex unicyclic graph G, ξd(G)?4n²−9n+1, with equality holding if and only if G is the graph obtained by adding an edge between two pendent vertices of n-vertex star. In this note, we give a short and unified proof of the above two results.     

Contributions to the theory of domination,independence and irredundance in graphs

A vertex x in a subset X of vertices of an undirected graph is redundant if its closed neighbourhood is contained in the union of closed neighbourhoods of vertices of X?{x}. In the context of a communications network, this means that any vertex which may receive communications from X may also be informed from X?{x}. The lower and upper irredundance numbers ir(G) and IR(G) are respectively the minimum and maximum cardinalities taken over all maximal sets of vertices having no redundancies. The domination number γ(G) and upper domination number Γ(G) are respectively the minimum and maximum cardinalities taken over all minimal dominating sets of G. The independent domination number i(G) and the independence number β(G) are respectively the minimum and maximum cardinalities taken over all maximal independent sets of vertices of G.A variety of inequalities involving these quantities are established and sufficient conditions for the equality of the three upper parameters are given. In particular a conjecture of Hoyler and Cockayne [9], namely $\text{i+β?2p + 2δ - 2}\text{2pδ}$, is proved.     

Some families of strongly clean rings

A ring R with identity is called strongly clean if every element of R is the sum of an idempotent and a unit that commute with each other. For a commutative local ring R and for an arbitrary integer n?2, the paper deals with the question whether the strongly clean property of M_n(R[[x]]), , and M_n(RC₂) follows from the strongly clean property of M_n(R). This is ‘Yes’ if n=2 by a known result.     

Mixed sums of squares and triangular numbers (III)

In this paper we confirm a conjecture of Sun which states that each positive integer is a sum of a square, an odd square and a triangular number. Given any positive integer m, we show that p=2m+1 is a prime congruent to 3 modulo 4 if and only if Tm=m(m+1)/2 cannot be expressed as a sum of two odd squares and a triangular number, i.e., p²=x²+8(y²+z²) for no odd integers x,y,z. We also show that a positive integer cannot be written as a sum of an odd square and two triangular numbers if and only if it is of the form 2Tm(m>0) with 2m+1 having no prime divisor congruent to 3 modulo 4.     

Fixed point property on symmetric products

For a metric continuum X, let Fn(X)={A⊂X:A is nonempty and has at most n points}. In this paper we show a continuum X such that F₂(X) has the fixed point property while X does not have it.     

Convex n-ominoes

Unit squares having their vertices at integer points in the Carresian plane are called cells. A connected union of n distinct cells having no finite cut set is an n-omino. Two n-ominoes are the same if one is mapped onto the other by a translation of the plane. An n-omino is convex if the cells in each row and each column to an a connected strip. When viewed from a distance, most convex n-ominoes resemble rods tilted 45° from the vertical with horizontal (and vertical) thickness roughly equal to 2.37597. If c(n) denotes the number of convex n-ominoes, then c(n) ～ fyⁿ, where y = 2.30914 and f = 2.67564. (It is understood that all constants are accurate to within -$\text{1}\text{2}$ in the last place.)     

Maximum Distance Between Slater Orders and Copeland Orders of Tournaments

Given a tournament T?=?(X, A), we consider two tournament solutions applied to T: Slater’s solution and Copeland’s solution. Slater’s solution consists in determining the linear orders obtained by reversing a minimum number of directed edges of T in order to make T transitive. Copeland’s solution applied to T ranks the vertices of T according to their decreasing out-degrees. The aim of this paper is to compare the results provided by these two methods: to which extent can they lead to different orders? We consider three cases: T is any tournament, T is strongly connected, T has only one Slater order. For each one of these three cases, we specify the maximum of the symmetric difference distance between Slater orders and Copeland orders. More precisely, thanks to a result dealing with arc-disjoint circuits in circular tournaments, we show that this maximum is equal to n(n???1)/2 if T is any tournament on an odd number n of vertices, to (n ²???3n?+?2)/2 if T is any tournament on an even number n of vertices, to n(n???1)/2 if T is strongly connected with an odd number n of vertices, to (n ²???3n???2)/2 if T is strongly connected with an even number n of vertices greater than or equal to 8, to (n ²???5n?+?6)/2 if T has an odd number n of vertices and only one Slater order, to (n ²???5n?+?8)/2 if T has an even number n of vertices and only one Slater order.     

On intersection multigraphs of hypergraphs

The sum of the cardinalities of all the edges of a hypergraph is computed in two different ways. This result is used to treat the generalisation of the notion of cyclomatic number for hypergraphs. Among others the following result is obtained: The cyclomatic number of the hypergraph H vanishes if and only if some maximum forest of the weighted intersection graph of H has the property that for every vertex of H the subgraph of the forest induced by those edges containing that vertex is connected.     

Numerical index of absolute sums of Banach spaces

We study the numerical index of absolute sums of Banach spaces, giving general conditions which imply that the numerical index of the sum is less or equal than the infimum of the numerical indices of the summands and we provide some examples where the equality holds covering the already known case of c₀-, ?₁- and ?_∞-sums and giving as a new result the case of E-sums where E has the RNP and n(E)=1 (in particular for finite-dimensional E with n(E)=1). We also show that the numerical index of a Banach space Z which contains a dense union of increasing one-complemented subspaces is greater or equal than the limit superior of the numerical indices of those subspaces. Using these results, we give a detailed short proof of the already known fact that, for a fixed p, the numerical indices of all infinite-dimensional Lp(μ)-spaces coincide.     

A generalization of Dirac’s theorem for K(1,3)-free graphs

It is known that if a 2-connected graphG of sufficiently large ordern satisfies the property that the union of the neighborhoods of each pair of vertices has cardinality at leastn/2, thenG is hamiltonian. In this paper, we obtain a similar generalization of Dirac’s Theorem forK(1,3)-free graphs. In particular, we show that ifG is a 2-connectedK(1,3)-free graph of ordern with the cardinality of the union of the neighborhoods of each pair of vertices at least (n+1)/3, thenG is hamiltonian. We also investigate several other related properties inK(1,3)-free graphs such as traceability, hamiltonian-connectedness, and pancyclicity. Partially Supported by O. N. R. Contract Number N00014-88-K-0070. Partially Supported by O. N. R. Contract Number N00014-85-K-0694.     

On n-Hamiltonian line graphs

With each nonempty graph G one can associate a graph L(G), called the line graph of G, with the property that there exists a one-to-one correspondence between E(G) and V(L(G)) such that two vertices of L(G) are adjacent if and only if the corresponding edges of G are adjacent. For integers m ≥ 2, the mth iterated line graph L^m(G) of G is defined to be L(L^m-1(G)). A graph G of order p ≥ 3 is n-Hamiltonian, 0 ≤ n ≤ p ? 3, if the removal of any k vertices, 0 ≤ k ≤ n, results in a Hamiltonian graph. It is shown that if G is a connected graph with δ(G) ≥ 3, where δ(G) denotes the minimum degree of G, then L²(G) is (δ(G) ? 3)-Hamiltonian. Furthermore, if G is 2-connected and δ(G) ≥ 4, then L²(G) is (2δ(G) ? 4)-Hamiltonian. For a connected graph G which is neither a path, a cycle, nor the graph K(1, 3) and for any positive integer n, the existence of an integer k such that L^m(G) is n-Hamiltonian for every m ≥ k is exhibited. Then, for the special case n = 1, bounds on (and, in some cases, the exact value of) the smallest such integer k are determined for various classes of graphs.     

On decomposition of r-partite graphs into edge-disjoint hamilton circuits

Let K(n;r) denote the complete r-partite graph K(n, n,…, n). It is shown here that for all even n(r ? 1) ? 2, K(n;r) is the union of $\text{n(r ? 1)}\text{2}$ of its Hamilton circuits which are mutually edge-disjoint, and for all odd n(r ? 1) ? 1, K(n;r) is the union of $\text{(n(r ? 1) ? 1)}\text{2}$ of its Hamilton circuits and a 1-factor, all of which are mutually edge-disjoint.     

Hamiltonian Cycles and Symmetric Chains in Boolean Lattices

Let B(n) be the subset lattice of \({\{1,2,\dots, n\}.}\) Sperner’s theorem states that the width of B(n) is equal to the size of its biggest level. There have been several elegant proofs of this result, including an approach that shows that B(n) has a symmetric chain partition. Another famous result concerning B(n) is that its cover graph is hamiltonian. Motivated by these ideas and by the Middle Two Levels conjecture, we consider posets that have the Hamiltonian Cycle–Symmetric Chain Partition (HC-SCP) property. A poset of width w has this property if its cover graph has a hamiltonian cycle which parses into w symmetric chains. We show that the subset lattices have the HC-SCP property, and we obtain this result as a special case of a more general treatment.     

Estimate of a complete rational trigonometric sum

Supposef is a polynomial of degree n≥3 with integral coefficientsa ₀,a ₁,...,a _n; q is a natural number; (a ₁,...,a _n, q)=1,f(0) = 0. It is proved that $$\left| {\sum\nolimits_{x = 1}^q {e^{2\pi if(x)/q} } } \right|< e^{5n^2 /\ln n} q^{1 - 1/n} $$ .