Claw‐decompositions and tutte‐orientations

We conjecture that, for each tree T, there exists a natural number k_T such that the following holds: If G is a k_T‐edge‐connected graph such that |E(T)| divides |E(G)|, then the edges of G can be divided into parts, each of which is isomorphic to T. We prove that for T = K_1,3 (the claw), this holds if and only if there exists a (smallest) natural number k_t such that every k_t‐edge‐connected graph has an orientation for which the indegree of each vertex equals its outdegree modulo 3. Tutte's 3‐flow conjecture says that k_t = 4. We prove the weaker statement that every 4$\lceil$ log n$\rceil$ ‐edge‐connected graph with n vertices has an edge‐decomposition into claws provided its number of edges is divisible by 3. We also prove that every triangulation of a surface has an edge‐decomposition into claws. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 52: 135–146, 2006     

The chromatic Ramsey number of odd wheels

We prove that the chromatic Ramsey number of every odd wheel W_{2k+ 1}, k?2 is 14. That is, for every odd wheel W_{2k+ 1}, there exists a 14‐chromatic graph F such that when the edges of F are two‐coloured, there is a monochromatic copy of W_{2k+ 1} in F, and no graph F with chromatic number 13 has the same property. We ask whether a natural extension of odd wheels to the family of generalized Mycielski graphs could help to prove the Burr–Erd?s–Lovász conjecture on the minimum possible chromatic Ramsey number of an n‐chromatic graph. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 69:198‐205, 2012     

Two‐coloring random hypergraphs

A 2‐coloring of a hypergraph is a mapping from its vertex set to a set of two colors such that no edge is monochromatic. Let H=H(k, n, p) be a random k‐uniform hypergraph on a vertex set V of cardinality n, where each k‐subset of V is an edge of H with probability p, independently of all other k‐subsets. Let $ m = p{{n}\choose{k}}$ denote the expected number of edges in H. Let us say that a sequence of events ?_n holds with high probability (w.h.p.) if lim_n→∞Pr[?_n]=1. It is easy to show that if m=c2^kn then w.h.p H is not 2‐colorable for c>ln 2/2. We prove that there exists a constant c>0 such that if m=(c2^k/k)n, then w.h.p H is 2‐colorable. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Random Struct. Alg. 20: 249–259, 2002     

The Hardness of 3-Uniform Hypergraph Coloring

We prove that coloring a 3-uniform 2-colorable hypergraph with c colors is NP-hard for any constant c. The best known algorithm [20] colors such a graph using O(n^1/5) colors. Our result immediately implies that for any constants k ≥ 3 and c₂ > c₁ > 1, coloring a k-uniform c₁-colorable hypergraph with c₂ colors is NP-hard; the case k = 2, however, remains wide open. This is the first hardness result for approximately-coloring a 3-uniform hypergraph that is colorable with a constant number of colors. For k ≥ 4 such a result has been shown by [14], who also discussed the inherent difference between the k = 3 case and k ≥ 4. Our proof presents a new connection between the Long-Code and the Kneser graph, and relies on the high chromatic numbers of the Kneser graph [19,22] and the Schrijver graph [26]. We prove a certain maximization variant of the Kneser conjecture, namely that any coloring of the Kneser graph by fewer colors than its chromatic number, has ‘many’ non-monochromatic edges. * Research supported by NSF grant CCR-9987845. † Supported by an Alon Fellowship and by NSF grant CCR-9987845. ‡ Work supported in part by NSF grants CCF-9988526 and DMS 9729992, and the State of New Jersery.     

On k-leaf connectivity of a random graph

We prove that, in a random graph with n vertices and N = cn log n edges, the subgraph generated by a set of all vertices of degree at least k + 1 is k-leaf connected for c > 1/4. A threshold function for k-leaf connectivity is also found.     

Edge disjoint Hamilton cycles in sparse random graphs of minimum degree at least k

Let G_n,m,k denote the space of simple graphs with n vertices, m edges, and minimum degree at least k, each graph G being equiprobable. Let G have property A_k, if G contains ⌊(k − 1)/2⌋ edge disjoint Hamilton cycles, and, if k is even, a further edge disjoint matching of size ⌊n/2⌋. We prove that, for k ≥ 3, there is a constant C_k such that if 2m ≥ C_kn then A_k occurs in G_n,m,k with probability tending to 1 as n → ∞. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J. Graph Theory 34: 42–59, 2000     

The extremal function for 3-linked graphs

A graph is k-linked if for every set of 2k distinct vertices {s₁,…,s_k,t₁,…,t_k} there exist disjoint paths P₁,…,P_k such that the endpoints of P_i are s_i and t_i. We prove every 6-connected graph on n vertices with 5n−14 edges is 3-linked. This is optimal, in that there exist 6-connected graphs on n vertices with 5n−15 edges that are not 3-linked for arbitrarily large values of n.     

Bicolored Matchings in Some Classes of Graphs

We consider the problem of finding in a graph a set R of edges to be colored in red so that there are maximum matchings having some prescribed numbers of red edges. For regular bipartite graphs with n nodes on each side, we give sufficient conditions for the existence of a set R with |R|=n+1 such that perfect matchings with k red edges exist for all k,0≤k≤n. Given two integers p<q we also determine the minimum cardinality of a set R of red edges such that there are perfect matchings with p red edges and with q red edges. For 3-regular bipartite graphs, we show that if p≤4 there is a set R with |R|=p for which perfect matchings M_k exist with |M_k∩R|≤k for all k≤p. For trees we design a linear time algorithm to determine a minimum set R of red edges such that there exist maximum matchings with k red edges for the largest possible number of values of k.     

On the structure of linear graphs

Denote byG(n; m) a graph ofn vertices andm edges. We prove that everyG(n; [n ²/4]+1) contains a circuit ofl edges for every 3 ≦l<c ₂ n, also that everyG(n; [n ²/4]+1) contains ak _e(u _n, u_n) withu _n=[c ₁ logn] (for the definition ofk _e(u _n, u_n) see the introduction). Finally fort>t ₀ everyG(n; [tn ^3/2]) contains a circuit of 2l edges for 2≦l<c ₃ t ². This work was done while the author received support from the National Science Foundation, N.S.F. G.88.     

Path and cycle sub-ramsey numbers and an edge-colouring conjecture

We show the existence of a constant c such that if n ⩾ ck³ and the edges of K_n are coloured using no colour more than k times then there is a Hamilton path with all edges of distinct colours. From this we infer that sr(P_n, k) = sr(C_n, k) = n, whenever n ⩾ ck³.     

2-Colored triangles in edge-colored complete graphs, II

The largest number n = n(k) for which there exists a k-coloring of the edges of k_n with every triangle 2-colored is found to be n(k) = 2^r5^m, where k = 2m + r and r = 0 or 1, and all such colorings are given. We also prove the best possible result that a k-colored K_p satisfying 1 < k < 1 + √p contains at most k − 2 vertices not in a bichromatic triangle.     

Some remarks on the odd hadwiger’s conjecture

We say that H has an odd complete minor of order at least l if there are l vertex disjoint trees in H such that every two of them are joined by an edge, and in addition, all the vertices of trees are two-colored in such a way that the edges within the trees are bichromatic, but the edges between trees are monochromatic. Gerards and Seymour conjectured that if a graph has no odd complete minor of order l, then it is (l ? 1)-colorable. This is substantially stronger than the well-known conjecture of Hadwiger. Recently, Geelen et al. proved that there exists a constant c such that any graph with no odd K _k -minor is ck√logk-colorable. However, it is not known if there exists an absolute constant c such that any graph with no odd K _k -minor is ck-colorable. Motivated by these facts, in this paper, we shall first prove that, for any k, there exists a constant f(k) such that every (496k + 13)-connected graph with at least f(k) vertices has either an odd complete minor of size at least k or a vertex set X of order at most 8k such that G–X is bipartite. Since any bipartite graph does not contain an odd complete minor of size at least three, the second condition is necessary. This is an analogous result of Böhme et al. We also prove that every graph G on n vertices has an odd complete minor of size at least n/2α(G) ? 1, where α(G) denotes the independence number of G. This is an analogous result of Duchet and Meyniel. We obtain a better result for the case α(G)= 3.     

A note on a conjecture about cycles with many incident chords

Given positive integers n and k, let g_k(n) denote the maximum number of edges of a graph on n vertices that does not contain a cycle with k chords incident to a vertex on the cycle. Bollobás conjectured as an exercise in [2, p. 398, Problem 13] that there exists a function n(k) such that g_k(n) = (k + 1)n ? (k + 1)² for all n ≥ n(k). Using an old result of Bondy [ 3 ], we prove the conjecture, showing that n(k) ≤ 3 k + 3. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Graph Theory 46: 180–182, 2004     

Hypergraphs with independent neighborhoods

For each k ≥ 2, let ρ _k ∈ (0, 1) be the largest number such that there exist k-uniform hypergraphs on n vertices with independent neighborhoods and (ρ _k + o(1))( _k ⁿ ) edges as n → ∞. We prove that ρ _k = 1 − 2logk/k + Θ(log log k/k) as k → ∞. This disproves a conjecture of Füredi and the last two authors.     

A note on on-line ranking number of graphs

A k-ranking of a graph G = (V, E) is a mapping ϕ: V → {1, 2, ..., k} such that each path with end vertices of the same colour c contains an internal vertex with colour greater than c. The ranking number of a graph G is the smallest positive integer k admitting a k-ranking of G. In the on-line version of the problem, the vertices v ₁, v ², ..., v _n of G arrive one by one in an arbitrary order, and only the edges of the induced graph G[{v ₁, v ₂, ..., v _i }] are known when the colour for the vertex v _i has to be chosen. The on-line ranking number of a graph G is the smallest positive integer k such that there exists an algorithm that produces a k-ranking of G for an arbitrary input sequence of its vertices. We show that there are graphs with arbitrarily large difference and arbitrarily large ratio between the ranking number and the on-line ranking number. We also determine the on-line ranking number of complete n-partite graphs. The question of additivity and heredity is discussed as well.     

Subgraphs of colour-critical graphs

Some problems and results on the distribution of subgraphs in colour-critical graphs are discussed. In section 3 arbitrarily largek-critical graphs withn vertices are constructed such that, in order to reduce the chromatic number tok−2, at leastc _k n ² edges must be removed. In section 4 it is proved that a 4-critical graph withn vertices contains at mostn triangles. Further it is proved that ak-critical graph which is not a complete graph contains a (k−1)-critical graph which is not a complete graph.     

Coloring 4‐cycle systems

An m‐cycle system of order n is a partition of the edges of the complete graph K_n into m‐cycles. We investigate k‐colorings of 4‐cycle systems in which no 4‐cycle is monochromatic. For any k ≥ 3, we construct a k‐chromatic 4‐cycle system. We also show that for any k ge; 2, there exists an integer w_k such that for all admissible n ≥ w_k, there is a k‐chromatic 4‐cycle system of order n. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Combin Designs     

On three zero-sum Ramsey-type problems

For a graph G whose number of edges is divisible by k, let R(G,Z_k) denote the minimum integer r such that for every function f: E(K_r) ? Z_k there is a copy G¹ of G in K_r so that Σe∈E(G¹) f(e) = 0 (in Z_k). We prove that for every integer k₁ R(K_n, Z_k) ≤ n + O(k³ log k) provided n is sufficiently large as a function of k and k divides (). If, in addition, k is an odd prime-power then R(K_n, Z_k) ≤ n + 2k - 2 and this is tight if k is a prime that divides n. A related result is obtained for hypergraphs. It is further shown that for every graph G on n vertices with an even number of edges R(G,Z₂) ≤ n + 2. This estimate is sharp. © 1993 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

On the Cop Number of a Graph

The cop number c(G) of a graph G is an invariant connected with the genus and the girth. We prove that for a fixed k there is a polynomial-time algorithm which decides whether c(G) ≤ k. This settles a question of T. Andreae. Moreover, we show that every graph is topologically equivalent to a graph with c ≤ 2. Finally we consider a pursuit-evasion problem in Littlewood′s miscellany. We prove that two lions are not always sufficient to catch a man on a plane graph, provided the lions and the man have equal maximum speed. We deal both with a discrete motion (from vertex to vertex) and with a continuous motion. The discrete case is solved by showing that there are plane graphs of cop number 3 such that all the edges can be represented by straight segments of the same length.     

Regular subgraphs of dense graphs

Every graph onn vertices, with at leastc _k n logn edges contains ak-regular subgraph. This answers a question of Erdős and Sauer.