On the distance spectral radius of bipartite graphs

In this paper, we determine the unique graph with minimum distance spectral radius among all connected bipartite graphs of order $n$ with a given matching number. Moreover, we characterize the graphs with minimal distance spectral radius in the class of all connected bipartite graphs with a given vertex connectivity.     

Max-cut and extendability of matchings in distance-regular graphs

A connected graph $G$ of even order $v$ is called $t$-extendable if it contains a perfect matching, $t<v/2$ and any matching of $t$ edges is contained in some perfect matching. The extendability of $G$ is the maximum $t$ such that $G$ is $t$-extendable. Since its introduction by Plummer in the 1980s, this combinatorial parameter has been studied for many classes of interesting graphs. In 2005, Brouwer and Haemers proved that every distance-regular graph of even order is $1$-extendable and in 2014, Cioabă and Li showed that any connected strongly regular graph of even order is 3-extendable except for a small number of exceptions.In this paper, we extend and generalize these results. We prove that all distance-regular graphs with diameter $D\ge 3$ are 2-extendable and we also obtain several better lower bounds for the extendability of distance-regular graphs of valency $k\ge 3$ that depend on $k$, $\lambda$ and $\mu$, where $\lambda$ is the number of common neighbors of any two adjacent vertices and $\mu$ is the number of common neighbors of any two vertices in distance two. In many situations, we show that the extendability of a distance-regular graph with valency $k$ grows linearly in $k$. We conjecture that the extendability of a distance-regular graph of even order and valency $k$ is at least $\lceil k/2\rceil -1$ and we prove this fact for bipartite distance-regular graphs.In course of this investigation, we obtain some new bounds for the max-cut and the independence number of distance-regular graphs in terms of their size and odd girth and we prove that our inequalities are incomparable with known eigenvalue bounds for these combinatorial parameters.     

Clustering and domination in perfect graphs

A k-cluster in a graph is an induced subgraph on k vertices which maximizes the number of edges. Both the k-cluster problem and the k-dominating set problem are NP-complete for graphs in general. In this paper we investigate the complexity status of these problems on various sub-classes of perfect graphs. In particular, we examine comparability graphs, chordal graphs, bipartite graphs, split graphs, cographs and κ-trees. For example, it is shown that the k-cluster problem is NP-complete for both bipartite and chordal graphs and the independent k-dominating set problem is NP-complete for bipartite graphs. Furthermore, where the k-cluster problem is polynomial we study the weighted and connected versions as well. Similarly we also look at the minimum k-dominating set problem on families which have polynomial k-dominating set algorithms.     

On stable cutsets in claw-free graphs and planar graphs

A stable cutset in a connected graph is a stable set whose deletion disconnects the graph. Let $K_4$ and $K_{1,3}$ (claw) denote the complete (bipartite) graph on 4 and $1+3$ vertices. It is NP-complete to decide whether a line graph (hence a claw-free graph) with maximum degree five or a $K_4$-free graph admits a stable cutset. Here we describe algorithms deciding in polynomial time whether a claw-free graph with maximum degree at most four or whether a (claw, $K_4$)-free graph admits a stable cutset. As a by-product we obtain that the stable cutset problem is polynomially solvable for claw-free planar graphs, and also for planar line graphs.Thus, the computational complexity of the stable cutset problem is completely determined for claw-free graphs with respect to degree constraint, and for claw-free planar graphs. Moreover, we prove that the stable cutset problem remains NP-complete for $K_4$-free planar graphs with maximum degree five.     

An algorithm for finding a maximum t-matching excluding complete partite subgraphs

For an integer $t$ and a fixed graph $H$, we consider the problem of finding a maximum $t$-matching not containing $H$ as a subgraph, which we call the $H$-free $t$-matching problem. This problem is a generalization of the problem of finding a maximum $2$-matching with no short cycles, which has been well-studied as a natural relaxation of the Hamiltonian circuit problem. When $H$ is a complete graph $K_{t+1}$ or a complete bipartite graph $K_{t,t}$, in 2010, Bérczi and Végh gave a polynomial-time algorithm for the $H$-free $t$-matching problem in simple graphs with maximum degree at most $t+1$. A main contribution of this paper is to extend this result to the case when $H$ is a $t$-regular complete partite graph. We also show that the problem is NP-complete when $H$ is a connected $t$-regular graph that is not complete partite. Since it is known that, for a connected $t$-regular graph $H$, the degree sequences of all $H$-free $t$-matchings in a graph form a jump system if and only if $H$ is a complete partite graph, our results show that the polynomial-time solvability of the $H$-free $t$-matching problem is consistent with this condition.     

Chordal bipartite completion of colored graphs

Golumbic, Kaplan, and Shamir [Graph sandwich problems, J. Algorithms 19 (1995) 449-473], in their paper on graph sandwich problems published in 1995, left the status of the sandwich problems for strongly chordal graphs and chordal bipartite graphs open. It was recently shown [C.M.H. de Figueiredo, L. Faria, S. Klein, R. Sritharan, On the complexity of the sandwich problems for strongly chordal graphs and chordal bipartite graphs, Theoret. Comput. Sci., accepted for publication] that the sandwich problem for strongly chordal graphs is NP-complete. We show that given graph G with a proper vertex coloring c, determining whether there is a supergraph of G that is chordal bipartite and also is properly colored by c is NP-complete. This implies that the sandwich problem for chordal bipartite graphs is also NP-complete.     

Monochromatic tree covers and Ramsey numbers for set-coloured graphs

We consider a generalisation of the classical Ramsey theory setting to a setting where each of the edges of the underlying host graph is coloured with a set of colours (instead of just one colour). We give bounds for monochromatic tree covers in this setting, both for an underlying complete graph, and an underlying complete bipartite graph. We also discuss a generalisation of Ramsey numbers to our setting and propose some other new directions.Our results for tree covers in complete graphs imply that a stronger version of Ryser’s conjecture holds for $k$-intersecting $r$-partite $r$-uniform hypergraphs: they have a transversal of size at most $r?k$. (Similar results have been obtained by Király et al., see below.) However, we also show that the bound $r?k$ is not best possible in general.     

Acyclic homomorphisms to stars of graph Cartesian products and chordal bipartite graphs

Homomorphisms to a given graph $H$ ($H$-colourings) are considered in the literature among other graph colouring concepts. We restrict our attention to a special class of $H$-colourings, namely $H$ is assumed to be a star. Our additional requirement is that the set of vertices of a graph $G$ mapped into the central vertex of the star and any other colour class induce in $G$ an acyclic subgraph. We investigate the existence of such a homomorphism to a star of given order. The complexity of this problem is studied. Moreover, the smallest order of a star for which a homomorphism of a given graph $G$ with desired features exists is considered. Some exact values and many bounds of this number for chordal bipartite graphs, cylinders, grids, in particular hypercubes, are given. As an application of these results, we obtain some bounds on the cardinality of the minimum feedback vertex set for specified graph classes.     

A lower bound on the acyclic matching number of subcubic graphs

The acyclic matching number of a graph $G$ is the largest size of an acyclic matching in $G$, that is, a matching $M$ in $G$ such that the subgraph of $G$ induced by the vertices incident to edges in $M$ is a forest. We show that the acyclic matching number of a connected subcubic graph $G$ with $m$ edges is at least $m∕6$ except for two graphs of order 5 and 6.     

A generalization of Hungarian method and Hall’s theorem with applications in wireless sensor networks

In this paper, we consider various problems concerning quasi-matchings and semi-matchings in bipartite graphs, which generalize the classical problem of determining a perfect matching in bipartite graphs. We prove a generalization of Hall’s marriage theorem, and present an algorithm that solves the problem of determining a lexicographically minimum $g$-quasi-matching (that is a set $F$ of edges in a bipartite graph such that in one set of the bipartition every vertex $v$ has at least $g\left(v\right)$ incident edges from $F$, where $g$ is a so-called need mapping, while on the other side of the bipartition the distribution of degrees with respect to $F$ is lexicographically minimum). We obtain that finding a lexicographically minimum quasi-matching is equivalent to minimizing any strictly convex function on the degrees of the A-side of a quasi-matching and use this fact to prove a more general statement: the optima of any component-based strictly convex cost function on any subset of $L_1$-sphere in ${\mathbb{N}}^n$ are precisely the lexicographically minimal elements of this subset. We also present an application in designing optimal CDMA-based wireless sensor networks.     

Sharp upper bounds on the second largest eigenvalues of connected graphs

Let ${\lambda }_2$ be the second largest eigenvalue of a graph. Powers (1988) [4] gave some upper bounds of ${\lambda }_2$ for general graphs and bipartite graphs, respectively. Considering that these bounds are not always attainable for connected graphs, we present sharp upper bounds of ${\lambda }_2$ for connected graphs and connected bipartite graphs in this paper. Moreover, the extremal graphs are completely characterized.