A census of highly symmetric combinatorial designs

As a consequence of the classification of the finite simple groups, it has been possible in recent years to characterize Steiner t-designs, that is t-(v,k,1) designs, mainly for t=2, admitting groups of automorphisms with sufficiently strong symmetry properties. However, despite the finite simple group classification, for Steiner t-designs with t>2 most of these characterizations have remained long-standing challenging problems. Especially, the determination of all flag-transitive Steiner t-designs with 3≤t≤6 is of particular interest and has been open for about 40 years (cf. Delandtsheer (Geom. Dedicata 41, p. 147, 1992 and Handbook of Incidence Geometry, Elsevier Science, Amsterdam, 1995, p. 273), but presumably dating back to 1965). The present paper continues the author’s work (see Huber (J. Comb. Theory Ser. A 94, 180–190, 2001; Adv. Geom. 5, 195–221, 2005; J. Algebr. Comb., 2007, to appear)) of classifying all flag-transitive Steiner 3-designs and 4-designs. We give a complete classification of all flag-transitive Steiner 5-designs and prove furthermore that there are no non-trivial flag-transitive Steiner 6-designs. Both results rely on the classification of the finite 3-homogeneous permutation groups. Moreover, we survey some of the most general results on highly symmetric Steiner t-designs.      

On solvable minimally transitive permutation groups

We investigate properties of finite transitive permutation groups in which all proper subgroups of G act intransitively on . In particular, we are interested in reduction theorems for minimally transitive representations of solvable groups. Work partially supported by M.I.U.R. and London Mathematical Society.     

马休群与斯坦诺5设计

讨论了马体群旗传递作用于斯坦诺5设计上的情况,得到了如下结论：设D=（X,Ω,I）是非平凡的斯坦诺5设计,D的自同构群G旗传递地作用在D上。若G是几乎单群,则（i）基柱Soc（G）不是下列单群：N=Mv,v=11,22,23和N=M11,v=12（ii）若N=M12,v=12,则D是一个5-（12,6,1）设计,且G M12（iii）若N=M24,v=24,则D是一个5-（24,8,1）设计,且G M24。     

The locally 2-arc transitive graphs admitting an almost simple group of Suzuki type

In this paper, seven families of vertex-intransitive locally (G,2)-arc transitive graphs are constructed, where Sz(q)?G?Aut(Sz(q)), q=²2k+1 for some k∈N. It is then shown that for any graph Γ in one of these families, Sz(q)?Aut(Γ)?Aut(Sz(q)) and that the only locally 2-arc transitive graphs admitting an almost simple group of Suzuki type whose vertices all have valency at least three are (i) graphs in these seven families, (ii) (vertex transitive) 2-arc transitive graphs admitting an almost simple group of Suzuki type, or (iii) double covers of the graphs in (ii). Since the graphs in (ii) have been classified by Fang and Praeger (1999) [6], this completes the classification of locally 2-arc transitive graphs admitting a Suzuki simple group     

A new class of transitive graphs

Let n and k be integers with n≥k≥0. This paper presents a new class of graphs H(n,k), which contains hypercubes and some well-known graphs, such as Johnson graphs, Kneser graphs and Petersen graph, as its subgraphs. The authors present some results of algebraic and topological properties of H(n,k). For example, H(n,k) is a Cayley graph, the automorphism group of H(n,k) contains a subgroup of order 2ⁿn! and H(n,k) has a maximal connectivity and is hamiltonian if k is odd; it consists of two isomorphic connected components if k is even. Moreover, the diameter of H(n,k) is determined if k is odd.     

On transitive one-factorizations of arc-transitive graphs

It is shown that transitive 1-factorizations of arc-transitive graphs exist if and only if certain factorizations of their automorphism groups exist. This relation provides a method for constructing and characterizing transitive 1-factorizations for certain classes of arc-transitive graphs. Then a characterization is given of 2-arc-transitive graphs which have transitive 1-factorizations. In this characterization, some 2-arc transitive graphs and their transitive 1-factorizations are constructed.     

On transitive Cayley graphs of strong semilattices of right (left) groups

We investigate Cayley graphs of strong semilattices of right (left) groups, of right (left) zero semigroups, and of groups. We show under which conditions they enjoy the property of automorphism vertex transitivity in analogy to Cayley graphs of groups.     

A classification of tightly attached half-arc-transitive graphs of valency 4

A graph is said to be half-arc-transitive if its automorphism group acts transitively on the set of its vertices and edges but not on the set of its arcs. With each half-arc-transitive graph of valency 4 a collection of the so-called alternating cycles is associated, all of which have the same even length. Half of this length is called the radius of the graph in question. Moreover, any two adjacent alternating cycles have the same number of common vertices. If this number, the so-called attachment number, coincides with the radius, we say that the graph is tightly attached. In [D. Marušič, Half-transitive group actions on finite graphs of valency 4, J. Combin. Theory Ser. B 73 (1998) 41–76], Marušič gave a classification of tightly attached half-arc-transitive graphs of valency 4 with odd radius. In this paper the even radius tightly attached graphs of valency 4 are classified, thus completing the classification of all tightly attached half-arc-transitive graphs of valency 4.     

Spanning cubic graph designs

Graph designs are natural extensions of BIBDs (balanced incomplete block designs). In this paper we explore spanning cubic graph designs and develop tools for constructing some of them. We show that K₁₆ can be decomposed into each of the 4060 connected cubic graphs of order 16, and into precisely 144 of the 147 disconnected cubic graphs of order 16. We also identify some infinite families of cubic graphs of order 6n+4 that decompose K_6n+4.     

The maximum spectral radius of -free graphs of given order and size

Suppose that G is a graph with n vertices and m edges, and let μ be the spectral radius of its adjacency matrix.Recently we showed that if G has no 4-cycle, then μ²-μn-1, with equality if and only if G is the friendship graph.Here we prove that if m9 and G has no 4-cycle, then μ²m, with equality if G is a star. For 4m8 this assertion fails.     

Projective two-weight codes with small parameters and their corresponding graphs

Projective two-weight codes with relatively small parameters are enumerated up to equivalence. Some properties of codes and related strongly-regular graphs are presented. I. Bouyukliev was partially supported by the Bulgarian National Science Fund under Contract MM1304/2003. J.Winne thanks the Fund for Scientific Research—Flanders (Belgium) for a Research grant.     

Planarity of Cayley graphs of graph products of groups

We obtain a complete classification of graph products of finite abelian groups whose Cayley graphs with respect to the standard presentations are planar.     

Minimum node covers and 2-bicritical graphs

The problem of finding a minimum cardinality set of nodes in a graph which meet every edge is of considerable theoretical as well as practical interest. Because of the difficulty of this problem, a linear relaxation of an integer programming model is sometimes used as a heuristic. In fact Nemhauser and Trotter showed that any variables which receive integer values in an optimal solution to the relaxation can retain the same values in an optimal solution to the integer program. We define 2-bicritical graphs and give several characterizations of them. One characterization is that they are precisely the graphs for which an optimal solution to the linear relaxation will have no integer valued variables. Then we show that almost all graphs are 2-bicritical and hence the linear relaxation almost never helps for large random graphs.This research was supported in part by the National Research Council of Canada.     

Frugal, acyclic and star colourings of graphs

Given a graph G=(V,E), a vertex colouring of V is t-frugal if no colour appears more than t times in any neighbourhood and is acyclic if each of the bipartite graphs consisting of the edges between any two colour classes is acyclic. For graphs of bounded maximum degree, Hind et al. (1997) [14] studied proper t-frugal colourings and Yuster (1998) [22] studied acyclic proper 2-frugal colourings. In this paper, we expand and generalise this study.     

Structure and automorphism groups of Hadamard designs

Let n be the order of a Hadamard design, and G any finite group. Then there exists many non-isomorphic Hadamard designs of order 2^{12|G| + 13} n with automorphism group isomorphic to G.This research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation.     

On the roots of Wiener polynomials of graphs

The Wiener polynomial of a connected graph $G$ is defined as $W(G;x)=\sum x^{d(u,v)}$, where $d(u,v)$ denotes the distance between $u$ and $v$, and the sum is taken over all unordered pairs of distinct vertices of $G$. We examine the nature and location of the roots of Wiener polynomials of graphs, and in particular trees. We show that while the maximum modulus among all roots of Wiener polynomials of graphs of order $n$ is $\left(\genfrac{}{}{0ex}{}{n}{2}\right)?1$, the maximum modulus among all roots of Wiener polynomials of trees of order $n$ grows linearly in $n$. We prove that the closure of the collection of real roots of Wiener polynomials of all graphs is precisely $(?\infty ,0]$, while in the case of trees, it contains $(?\infty ,?1]$. Finally, we demonstrate that the imaginary parts and (positive) real parts of roots of Wiener polynomials can be arbitrarily large.     

Computational complexity of reconstruction and isomorphism testing for designs and line graphs

Graphs with high symmetry or regularity are the main source for experimentally hard instances of the notoriously difficult graph isomorphism problem. In this paper, we study the computational complexity of isomorphism testing for line graphs of t-(v,k,λ) designs. For this class of highly regular graphs, we obtain a worst-case running time of O(vlogv+O(1)) for bounded parameters t, k, λ.In a first step, our approach makes use of the Babai-Luks algorithm to compute canonical forms of t-designs. In a second step, we show that t-designs can be reconstructed from their line graphs in polynomial-time. The first is algebraic in nature, the second purely combinatorial. For both, profound structural knowledge in design theory is required. Our results extend earlier complexity results about isomorphism testing of graphs generated from Steiner triple systems and block designs.     

New large sets of t‐designs with prescribed groups of automorphisms

In this article, we investigate the existence of large sets of 3‐designs of prime sizes with prescribed groups of automorphisms PSL(2,q) and PGL(2,q) for q < 60. We also construct some new interesting large sets by the use of the computer program DISCRETA. The results obtained through these direct methods along with known recursive constructions are combined to prove more extensive theorems on the existence of large sets. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Combin Designs 15: 210–220, 2007