Acyclic improper colouring of graphs with maximum degree 4

A k-colouring(not necessarily proper) of vertices of a graph is called acyclic, if for every pair of distinct colours i and j the subgraph induced by the edges whose endpoints have colours i and j is acyclic. We consider acyclic k-colourings such that each colour class induces a graph with a given(hereditary) property. In particular, we consider acyclic k-colourings in which each colour class induces a graph with maximum degree at most t, which are referred to as acyclic t-improper k-colourings. The acyclic t-improper chromatic number of a graph G is the smallest k for which there exists an acyclic t-improper k-colouring of G. We focus on acyclic colourings of graphs with maximum degree 4. We prove that 3 is an upper bound for the acyclic 3-improper chromatic number of this class of graphs. We also provide a non-trivial family of graphs with maximum degree4 whose acyclic 3-improper chromatic number is at most 2, namely, the graphs with maximum average degree at most 3. Finally, we prove that any graph G with Δ(G) 4 can be acyclically coloured with 4 colours in such a way that each colour class induces an acyclic graph with maximum degree at most 3.     

The competition number of a graph whose holes do not overlap much

Let D be an acyclic digraph. The competition graph of D is a graph which has the same vertex set as D and has an edge between u and v if and only if there exists a vertex x in D such that (u,x) and (v,x) are arcs of D. For any graph G, G together with sufficiently many isolated vertices is the competition graph of some acyclic digraph. The competition number k(G) of G is the smallest number of such isolated vertices.A hole of a graph is an induced cycle of length at least four. Kim (2005) [8] conjectured that the competition number of a graph with h holes is at most h+1. Recently, Li and Chang (2009) [11] showed that the conjecture is true when the holes are independent. In this paper, we show that the conjecture is true though the holes are not independent but mutually edge-disjoint.     

The dichromatic number of a digraph

In this paper the concept of dichromatic number of a digraph which is a generalization of the chromatic number of a graph is introduced. The dichromatic number of a digraph D is defined as the minimum number of colours required to colour the vertices of D in such a way that the chromatic classes induce acyclic subdigraphs in D. Some results relating the dichromatic number of D with the existence of cycles of special lengths in D are presented. Contributions to chromatic theory are also obtained. In particular, we generalize the theorem due to P. Erdös and A. Hajnal (Acta Math. Acad. Sci. Hungar.17 (1966), 61–99) which states the existence of odd cycles of length ≥_χ(G) ? 1 in any graph G.     

The competition number of a graph and the dimension of its hole space

The competition graph of a digraph D is a (simple undirected) graph which has the same vertex set as D and has an edge between x and y if and only if there exists a vertex v in D such that (x,v) and (y,v) are arcs of D. For any graph G, G together with sufficiently many isolated vertices is the competition graph of some acyclic digraph. The competition number k(G) of G is the smallest number of such isolated vertices. In general, it is hard to compute the competition number k(G) for a graph G and it has been one of the important research problems in the study of competition graphs to characterize a graph by its competition number. Recently, the relationship between the competition number and the number of holes of a graph has been studied. A hole of a graph is a cycle of length at least 4 as an induced subgraph. In this paper, we conjecture that the dimension of the hole space of a graph is not smaller than the competition number of the graph. We verify this conjecture for various kinds of graphs and show that our conjectured inequality is indeed an equality for connected triangle-free graphs.     

The elimination procedure for the competition number is not optimal

Given an acyclic digraph D, the competition graph C(D) is defined to be the undirected graph with V(D) as its vertex set and where vertices x and y are adjacent if there exists another vertex z such that the arcs (x,z) and (y,z) are both present in D. The competition number k(G) for an undirected graph G is the least number r such that there exists an acyclic digraph F on |V(G)|+r vertices where C(F) is G along with r isolated vertices. Kim and Roberts [The Elimination Procedure for the Competition Number, Ars Combin. 50 (1998) 97-113] introduced an elimination procedure for the competition number, and asked whether the procedure calculated the competition number for all graphs. We answer this question in the negative by demonstrating a graph where the elimination procedure does not calculate the competition number. This graph also provides a negative answer to a similar question about the related elimination procedure for the phylogeny number introduced by the current author in [S.G. Hartke, The Elimination Procedure for the Phylogeny Number, Ars Combin. 75 (2005) 297-311].     

A note on acyclic domination number in graphs of diameter two

A subset S of the vertex set of a graph G is called acyclic if the subgraph it induces in G contains no cycles. S is called an acyclic dominating set of G if it is both acyclic and dominating. The minimum cardinality of an acyclic dominating set, denoted by γ_a(G), is called the acyclic domination number of G. Hedetniemi et al. [Acyclic domination, Discrete Math. 222 (2000) 151-165] introduced the concept of acyclic domination and posed the following open problem: if δ(G) is the minimum degree of G, is γ_a(G)?δ(G) for any graph whose diameter is two? In this paper, we provide a negative answer to this question by showing that for any positive k, there is a graph G with diameter two such that γ_a(G)-δ(G)?k.     

Acyclic colorings of graphs with bounded degree

A k-coloring (not necessarily proper) of vertices of a graph is called acyclic, if for every pair of distinct colors i and j the subgraph induced by the edges whose endpoints have colors i and j is acyclic. We consider some generalized acyclic k-colorings, namely, we require that each color class induces an acyclic or bounded degree graph. Mainly we focus on graphs with maximum degree 5. We prove that any such graph has an acyclic 5-coloring such that each color class induces an acyclic graph with maximum degree at most 4. We prove that the problem of deciding whether a graph G has an acyclic 2-coloring in which each color class induces a graph with maximum degree at most 3 is NP-complete, even for graphs with maximum degree 5. We also give a linear-time algorithm for an acyclic t-improper coloring of any graph with maximum degree d assuming that the number of colors is large enough.     

Proper connection number of bipartite graphs

An edge-colored graph G is proper connected if every pair of vertices is connected by a proper path. The proper connection number of a connected graph G, denoted by pc(G), is the smallest number of colors that are needed to color the edges of G in order to make it proper connected. In this paper, we obtain the sharp upper bound for pc(G) of a general bipartite graph G and a series of extremal graphs. Additionally, we give a proper 2-coloring for a connected bipartite graph G having δ(G) ≥ 2 and a dominating cycle or a dominating complete bipartite subgraph, which implies pc(G) = 2. Furthermore, we get that the proper connection number of connected bipartite graphs with δ ≥ 2 and diam(G) ≤ 4 is two.     

Acyclic edge chromatic number of outerplanar graphs

A proper edge coloring of a graph G is called acyclic if there is no 2‐colored cycle in G. The acyclic edge chromatic number of G, denoted by χ(G), is the least number of colors in an acyclic edge coloring of G. In this paper, we determine completely the acyclic edge chromatic number of outerplanar graphs. The proof is constructive and supplies a polynomial time algorithm to acyclically color the edges of any outerplanar graph G using χ(G) colors. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 64: 22–36, 2010     

Game chromatic number of strong product graphs

The graph coloring game is a two-player game in which the two players properly color an uncolored vertex of G alternately. The first player wins the game if all vertices of G are colored, and the second wins otherwise. The game chromatic number of a graph G is the minimum integer k such that the first player has a winning strategy for the graph coloring game on G with k colors. There is a lot of literature on the game chromatic number of graph products, e.g., the Cartesian product and the lexicographic product. In this paper, we investigate the game chromatic number of the strong product of graphs, which is one of major graph products. In particular, we completely determine the game chromatic number of the strong product of a double star and a complete graph. Moreover, we estimate the game chromatic number of some King's graphs, which are the strong products of two paths.     

On trees with total domination number equal to edge-vertex domination number plus one

An edge e∈E(G) dominates a vertex v∈V(G) if e is incident with v or e is incident with a vertex adjacent to v. An edge-vertex dominating set of a graph G is a set D of edges of G such that every vertex of G is edge-vertex dominated by an edge of D. The edge-vertex domination number of a graph G is the minimum cardinality of an edge-vertex dominating set of G. A subset D?V(G) is a total dominating set of G if every vertex of G has a neighbor in D. The total domination number of G is the minimum cardinality of a total dominating set of G. We characterize all trees with total domination number equal to edge-vertex domination number plus one.     

A note on the independent domination number versus the domination number in bipartite graphs

Let γ(G) and i(G) be the domination number and the independent domination number of G, respectively. Rad and Volkmann posted a conjecture that i(G)/γ(G) ≤ Δ(G)/2 for any graph G, where Δ(G) is its maximum degree (see N. J. Rad, L. Volkmann (2013)). In this work, we verify the conjecture for bipartite graphs. Several graph classes attaining the extremal bound and graphs containing odd cycles with the ratio larger than Δ(G)/2 are provided as well.     

Vertex Arboricity and Vertex Degrees

The vertex arboricity of a graph G, denoted a(G), is the minimum number of subsets into which V(G) can be partitioned so that each subset induces an acyclic graph. We first give a vertex degree condition to guarantee \(a(G) \le k\), which is best possible in the same sense as Chvátal’s well-known hamiltonian degree condition. We then explore comparably strong degree conditions for \(a(G) \ge k\), and show that any such condition has intrinsic complexity which grows superpolynomially with the order of G.     

Acyclic edge coloring of graphs with large girths

A proper edge coloring of a graph G is called acyclic if there is no 2-colored cycle in G. The acyclic chromatic index of G, denoted by χ’a(G), is the least number of colors such that G has an acyclic edge k-coloring. Let G be a graph with maximum degree Δ and girth g(G), and let 1≤r≤2Δ be an integer. In this paper, it is shown that there exists a constant c > 0 such that if g(G)≥cΔ r log(Δ2/r) then χa(G)≤Δ + r + 1, which generalizes the result of Alon et al. in 2001. When G is restricted to series-parallel graphs, it is proved that χ’a(G) = Δ if Δ≥4 and g(G)≥4; or Δ≥3 and g(G)≥5.     

Even factors with a bounded number of components in iterated line graphs

We consider even factors with a bounded number of components in the n-times iterated line graphs L ⁿ (G). We present a characterization of a simple graph G such that L ⁿ (G) has an even factor with at most k components, based on the existence of a certain type of subgraphs in G. Moreover, we use this result to give some upper bounds for the minimum number of components of even factors in L ⁿ (G) and also show that the minimum number of components of even factors in L ⁿ (G) is stable under the closure operation on a claw-free graph G, which extends some known results. Our results show that it seems to be NP-hard to determine the minimum number of components of even factors of iterated line graphs. We also propose some problems for further research.     

The basis number of the Cartesian product of stars and wheels with different ladders

The basis number of a graph G is defined to be the least positive integer d such that G has a d-fold basis for the cycle space of G. We investigate the basis number of the cartesian product of stars and wheels with ladders, circular ladders and Möbius ladders.     

Connected graphs with a minimal number of spanning trees

The problem studied is the following: Find a simple connected graph G with given numbers of vertices and edges which minimizes the number t_μ(G), the number of spanning trees of the multigraph obtained from G by adding μ parallel edges between every pair of distinct vertices. If G is nearly complete (the number of edges qis ≥(₂^P)?p+2 where p is the number of vertices), then the solution to the minimization problem is unique (up to isomorphism) and the same for all values of μ. The present paper investigates the case whereq<(₂^P)?p+2. In this case the solution is not always unique and there does not always exist a common solution for all values of μ. A (small) class of graphs is given such that for any μ there exists a solution to the problem which is contained in this class. For μ = 0 there is only one graph in the class which solves the problem. This graph is described and the minimum value of t₀(G) is found. In order to derive these results a representation theorem is proved for the cofactors of a special class of matrices which contains the tree matrices associated with graphs.     

Chromatic number of sparse colored mixed planar graphs

A colored mixed graph has vertices linked by both colored arcs and colored edges. The chromatic number of such a graph G is defined as the smallest order of a colored mixed graph H such that there exists a (arc-color preserving) homomorphism from G to H. We study in this paper the colored mixed chromatic number of planar graphs, partial 2-trees and outerplanar graphs with given girth.     

Acyclic edge coloring of planar graphs without adjacent cycles

A proper edge coloring of a graph G is said to be acyclic if there is no bicolored cycle in G.The acyclic edge chromatic number of G,denoted byχ′a(G),is the smallest number of colors in an acyclic edge coloring of G.Let G be a planar graph with maximum degree.In this paper,we show thatχ′a(G)+2,if G has no adjacent i-and j-cycles for any i,j∈{3,4,5},which implies a result of Hou,Liu and Wu(2012);andχ′a(G)+3,if G has no adjacent i-and j-cycles for any i,j∈{3,4,6}.     

Improved bounds on the generalized acyclic chromatic number

An r-acyclic edge chromatic number of a graph G, denoted by a _r ^′ r(G), is the minimum number of colors used to produce an edge coloring of the graph such that adjacent edges receive different colors and every cycle C has at least min {|C|, r} colors. We prove that a _r ^′ r(G) ≤ (4r + 1)Δ(G), when the girth of the graph G equals to max{50, Δ(G)} and 4 ≤ r ≤ 7. If we relax the restriction of the girth to max {220, Δ(G)}, the upper bound of a _r ^′ r(G) is not larger than (2r + 5)Δ(G) with 4 ≤ r ≤ 10.