Substitution and atomic extension on greedy posets

In this paper, we study the operations of substitution and atomic extension on greedy posets. For the substitution operation, if P=(P ₁ , x, P ₂ )is a greedy poset, then P ₁ and P ₂ are greedy posets, the converse being false. However, for the atomic extension, P=P ₁ (x, P ₂ )is a greedy poset if and only if P ₁ and P ₂ are greedy posets. We prove also that the class of greedy semi-partitive lattices is the smallest one containing M _n (n2), B ₃ and closed by atomic extension. The class C _n of greedy posets with jump number n is infinite. However, we show that C _n can be obtained, in a very simple way, from a subclass D _n of finite cardinal ity. We construct D _n for n=1, 2.     

Planar graphs and poset dimension

We view the incidence relation of a graph G=(V. E) as an order relation on its vertices and edges, i.e. a<_G b if and only of a is a vertex and b is an edge incident on a. This leads to the definition of the order-dimension of G as the minimum number of total orders on V E whose intersection is <_G. Our main result is the characterization of planar graphs as the graphs whose order-dimension does not exceed three. Strong versions of several known properties of planar graphs are implied by this characterization. These properties include: each planar graph has arboricity at most three and each planar graph has a plane embedding whose edges are straight line segments. A nice feature of this embedding is that the coordinates of the vertices have a purely combinatorial meaning.     

Inequalities for the greedy dimensions of ordered sets

Every linear extension L: [x ₁<x ₂<...<x _m ] of an ordered set P on m points arises from the simple algorithm: For each i with 0i<m, choose x _i+1 as a minimal element of P–{x _j :ji}. A linear extension is said to be greedy, if we also require that x _i+1 covers x _i in P whenever possible. The greedy dimension of an ordered set is defined as the minimum number of greedy linear extensions of P whose intersection is P. In this paper, we develop several inequalities bounding the greedy dimension of P as a function of other parameters of P. We show that the greedy dimension of P does not exceed the width of P. If A is an antichain in P and |P–A|2, we show that the greedy dimension of P does not exceed |P–A|. As a consequence, the greedy dimension of P does not exceed |P|/2 when |P|4. If the width of P–A is n and n2, we show that the greedy dimension of P does not exceed n ²+n. If A is the set of minimal elements of P, then this inequality can be strengthened to 2n–1. If A is the set of maximal elements, then the inequality can be further strengthened to n+1. Examples are presented to show that each of these inequalities is best possible.Research supported in part by the National Science Foundation under ISP-80110451.Research supported in part by the National Science Foundation under ISP-80110451 and DMS-8401281.     

The order dimension of multinomial lattices

Using the notion of Ferrers dimension of incidence structures, the order dimension of multi-nomial lattices (i.e. lattices of multi-permutations) is determined. In particular, it is shown that the lattice of all permutations on ann-element set has dimensionn–1.     

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.     

Circle orders,N-gon orders and the crossing number

Let ={P ₁,...,P _m } be a family of sets. A partial order P(, <) on is naturally defined by the condition P _i <P _j iff P _i is contained in P _j . When the elements of are disks (i.e. circles together with their interiors), P(, <) is called a circle order; if the elements of are n-polygons, P(, <) is called an n-gon order. In this paper we study circle orders and n-gon orders. The crossing number of a partial order introduced in [5] is studied here. We show that for every n, there are partial orders with crossing number n. We prove next that the crossing number of circle orders is at most 2 and that the crossing number of n-gon orders is at most 2n. We then produce for every n4 partial orders of dimension n which are not circle orders. Also for every n>3, we prove that there are partial orders of dimension 2n+2 which are not n-gon orders. Finally, we prove that every partial order of dimension 2n is an n-gon order.This research was supported under Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC Canada) grant numbers A2507 and A0977.     

The order dimension of two levels of the Boolean lattice

LetB _n(s, t) denote the partially ordered set consisting of alls-subsets andt-subsets of ann-element underlying set where these sets are ordered by inclusion. Answering a question of Trotter we prove that dim(B _n(k, n–k))=n–2 for 3k<(1/7)n ^1/3. The proof uses extremal hypergraph theory.     

A sperner-type theorem

Let P=P ₁×P ₂×...×P _M be the direct product of symmetric chain orders P ₁, P ₂, ..., P _M . Let F be a subset of P containing no l+1 elements which are identical in M–1 components and linearly ordered in the Mth one. Then max |F|cM ^1/2lW(P), where W(P) is the cardinality of the largest level of P, and c is independent of P, M and l. Infinitely many P show that this result is best possible for every M and l apart from the constant factor c.     

The spread of a partial order

The deficiency of a partial order is the number of incomparable pairs. Another measure, the spread of a partial order is defined and its relation to the deficiency is established. In certain cases which arise naturally in the analysis of various sorting and selection algorithms where the partial order is only implicitly defined, the spread of the partial order is easier to estimate directly and provides a convenient way to estimate the deficiency.Partially supported by NSF Grant DCR-85-05053.Partially supported by NSF Grant DMS-85-05004.     

Generalizations of Tarski's fixed point theorem for order varieties of complete meet semilattices

A poset P is -conditionally complete ( a cardinal) if every set X P all of whose subsets of cardinality < have an upper bound has a least upper bound. For we characterize the subposets of a -complete poset which can occur as the set of fixed points of some montonic function on P. This yields a generalization of Tarski's fixed point theorem. We also show that for every the class of -conditionally complete posets forms an order variety and we exhibit a simple generating poset for each such class.Research supported in part by NSERC while the author was visiting Professor Ivo Rosenberg at the Université de Montreal.Research supported in part by NSF-grant DMS-8703743.     

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.     

Constructing greedy linear extensions by interchanging chains

A natural way to prove that a particular linear extension of an ordered set is ‘optimal’ with respect to the ‘jump number’ is to transform this linear extension ‘canonically’ into one that is ‘optimal’. We treat a ‘greedy chain interchange’ transformation which has applications to ordered sets for which each ‘greedy’ linear extension is ‘optimal’.     

A theory of recursive dimension for ordered sets

The classical theorem of R. P. Dilworth asserts that a partially ordered set of width n can be partitioned into n chains. Dilworth's theorem plays a central role in the dimension theory of partially ordered sets since chain partitions can be used to provide embeddings of partially ordered sets in the Cartesian product of chains. In particular, the dimension of a partially-ordered set never exceeds its width. In this paper, we consider analogous problems in the setting of recursive combinatorics where it is required that the partially ordered set and any associated partition or embedding be described by recursive functions. We establish several theorems providing upper bounds on the recursive dimension of a partially ordered set in terms of its width. The proofs are highly combinatorial in nature and involve a detailed analysis of a 2-person game in which one person builds a partially ordered set one point at a time and the other builds the partition or embedding.This paper was prepared while the authors were supported, in part, by NSF grant ISP-80-11451. In addition, the second author received support under NSF grant MCS-80-01778 and the third author received support under NSF grant MCS-82-02172.     

Lawless order

R. Baer asked whether the group operation of every (totally) ordered group can be redefined, keeping the same ordered set, so that the resulting structure is an Abelian ordered group. The answer is no. We construct an ordered set (G, ) which carries an ordered group (G, , ) but which islawless in the following sense. If (G, *, ) is an ordered group on the same carrier (G, ), then the group (G, *) satisfies no nontrivial equational law.Research partially supported by NSERC of Canada Grants #A4044 and A3040.Research partially supported by NSERC of Canada Grant #U0075.Research partially supported by a grant from the BSF.     

A partial order for the set of meanders

In this paper, we present a new approach for studying meanders in terms of noncrossing partitions. We show how this approach leads to a natural partial order on the set of meanders. In particular, meanders form a graded poset with regard to this partial order.     

The jump number of suborders of the power set order

Let P be an ordered set induced by several levels of a power set. We give a formula for the jump number of P and show that reverse lexicographic orderings of P are optimal. The proof is based on an extremal set result of Frankl and Kalai.     

Combinatorial representation and convex dimension of convex geometries

We develop a representation theory for convex geometries and meet distributive lattices in the spirit of Birkhoff's theorem characterizing distributive lattices. The results imply that every convex geometry on a set X has a canonical representation as a poset labelled by elements of X. These results are related to recent work of Korte and Lovász on antimatroids. We also compute the convex dimension of a convex geometry.Supported in part by NSF grant no. DMS-8501948.     

First order properties of random posets

Let =(n,p) be a binary relation on the set [n]={1, 2, ..., n} such that (i,i) for every i and (i,j) with probability p, independently for each pair i,j [n], where i<j. Define as the transitive closure of and denote poset ([n], ) by R(n, p). We show that for any constant p probability of each first order property of R(n, p) converges as n .     

Cycle-free partial orders and chordal comparability graphs

This paper studies a number of problems on cycle-free partial orders and chordal comparability graphs. The dimension of a cycle-free partial order is shown to be at most 4. A linear time algorithm is presented for determining whether a chordal directed graph is transitive, which yields an O(n ²) algorithm for recognizing chordal comparability graphs. An algorithm is presented for determining whether the transitive closure of a digraph is a cycle-free partial order in O(n+m _t)time, where m _tis the number of edges in the transitive closure.     

Shellability of exponential structures

We show that the poset of all partitions of an nd-set with block size divisible by d is shellable. Using similar techniques, it also follows that various other examples of exponential structures cited by Stanley are also shellable. The method used involves the notion of recursive atom orderings introduced by Björner and Wachs.Research supported in part by NATO post-doctoral grant administered by the NSF.