We show that any complete $k$-partite graph $G$ on $n$ vertices, with $k \ge 3$, whose edges are two-coloured, can be covered with two vertex-disjoint monochromatic paths of distinct colours. We prove this under the necessary assumption that the largest partition class of $G$ contains at most $n/2$ vertices. This extends known results for complete and complete bipartite graphs.
Secondly, we show that in the same situation, all but $o(n)$ vertices of the graph can be covered with two vertex-disjoint monochromatic cycles of distinct colours, if colourings close to a split colouring are excluded. From this we derive that the whole graph, if large enough, may be covered with 14 vertex-disjoint monochromatic cycles.
We answer a question of Gyárfás and Sárközy from 2013 by showing that every 2-edge-coloured complete 3-uniform hypergraph can be partitioned into two monochromatic tight paths of different colours. We also give a lower bound for the number of tight paths needed to partition any 2-edge-coloured complete r-partite r-uniform hypergraph. Finally, we show that any 2-edge-coloured complete bipartite graph has a partition into a monochromatic cycle and a monochromatic path, of different colours, unless the colouring is a split colouring.
We classify the countable homogeneous coloured multipartite graphs with any finite number of parts. By Fraisse's Theorem this amounts to classifying the families F of pairwise non-embeddable finite coloured multipartite graphs for which the class Forb(F) of multipartite graphs which forbid these is an amalgamation class. We show that once we understand such families F in the quadripartite case, things do not become any more complicated for larger numbers of parts.
In 1959, Goodman determined the minimum number of monochromatic triangles in a complete graph whose edge set is two-coloured. Goodman also raised the question of proving analogous results for complete graphs whose edge sets are coloured with more than two colours. In this paper, we determine the minimum number of monochromatic triangles and the colourings which achieve this minimum in a sufficiently large three-coloured complete graph.
Confirming and extending a conjecture by Guggiari, we show that every countable $(r+1)$-edge-coloured complete symmetric digraph containing no directed paths of edge-length $\ell_i$ for any colour $i\leq r$ can be covered by $\prod_{i\leq r} \ell_i$ pairwise disjoint monochromatic directed paths in colour $r+1$.
Li, Nikiforov and Schelp conjectured that a 2-edge coloured graph G with order n and minimal degree strictly greater than 3n/4 contains a monochromatic cycle of length l, for all l at least four and at most n/2. We prove this conjecture for sufficiently large n and also find all 2-edge coloured graphs with minimal degree equal to 3n/4 that do not contain all such cycles. Finally we show that, for all positive constants d and sufficiently large n, a 2-edge coloured graph G of order n with minimal degree at least 3n/4 either contains a monochromatic cycle of length at least (2/3+d/2)n, or, in on…
We show that for any colouring of the edges of the complete bipartite graph $K_{n,n}$ with 3 colours there are 5 disjoint monochromatic cycles which together cover all but $o(n)$ of the vertices. In the same situation, 18 disjoint monochromatic cycles together cover all vertices.
We investigate the problem of determining how many monochromatic trees are necessary to cover the vertices of an edge-coloured random graph. More precisely, we show that for $p\gg n^{-1/6}{(\ln n)}^{1/6}$, in any $3$-edge-colouring of the random graph $G(n,p)$ we can find three monochromatic trees such that their union covers all vertices. This improves, for three colours, a result of Bucić, Korándi and Sudakov.
We show that for every $η>0$, there exists $n_0$ such that for every even $n$, $n\ge n_0$, and every graph $G$ with $(2+η)n$ vertices and minimum degree at least $(7/4+4η)n$, each colouring of the edges of $G$ with three colours results in a monochromatic cycle of length $n$.
In 1978, Richard Rado showed that every edge-coloured complete graph of countably infinite order can be partitioned into monochromatic paths of different colours. He asked whether this remains true for uncountable complete graphs and a notion of \emph{generalised paths}. In 2016, Daniel Soukup answered this in the affirmative and conjectured that a similar result should hold for complete bipartite graphs with bipartition classes of the same infinite cardinality, namely that every such graph edge-coloured with $r$ colours can be partitioned into $2r-1$ monochromatic generalised paths with each …
We show that for every η > 0 there exists an integer n_0 such that every 2-colouring of the 3-uniform complete hypergraph on n \geq n_0 vertices contains two disjoint monochromatic tight cycles of distinct colours that together cover all but at most ηn vertices. The same result holds if we replace tight cycles with loose cycles.
P. Erdős proved that every 2-edge coloured complete graph on the natural numbers can be vertex decomposed into two monochromatic paths of different colour. This result was extended by R. Rado to an arbitrary finite number of colours. We prove that the vertices of every finite-edge coloured infinite complete graph can be partitioned into disjoint monochromatic paths of different colours. This answers a question of R. Rado from 1978.
Let $G = (V,E)$ be a simple graph and let $\{R,B\}$ be a partition of $E$. We prove that whenever $|E| + \min\{ |R|, |B| \} > { |V| \choose 2 }$, there exists a subgraph of $G$ isomorphic to $K_3$ which contains edges from both $R$ and $B$. We conjecture a natural generalization to partitions with more blocks.
We prove that for all integers $Δ,r \geq 2$, there is a constant $C = C(Δ,r) >0$ such that the following is true for every sequence $\mathcal{F} = \{F_1, F_2, \ldots\}$ of graphs with $v(F_n) = n$ and $Δ(F_n) \leq Δ$, for each $n \in \mathbb{N}$. In every $r$-edge-coloured $K_n$, there is a collection of at most $C$ monochromatic copies from $\mathcal{F}$ whose vertex-sets partition $V(K_n)$. This makes progress on a conjecture of Grinshpun and Sárközy.
Confirming a conjecture of Gyárfás, we prove that, for all natural numbers $k$ and $r$, the vertices of every $r$-edge-coloured complete $k$-uniform hypergraph can be partitioned into a bounded number (independent of the size of the hypergraph) of monochromatic tight cycles. We further prove that, for for all natural numbers $p$ and $r$, the vertices of every $r$-edge-coloured complete graph can be partitioned into a bounded number of $p$-th powers of cycles, settling a problem of Elekes, Soukup, Soukup and Szentmiklóssy. In fact we prove a common generalisation of both theorems which further …
Balogh, Barát, Gerbner, Gyárfás, and Sárközy proposed the following conjecture. Let $G$ be a graph on $n$ vertices with minimum degree at least $3n/4$. Then for every $2$-edge-colouring of $G$, the vertex set $V(G)$ may be partitioned into two vertex-disjoint cycles, one of each colour. We prove that this conjecture holds for $n$ large enough, improving approximate results by the aforementioned authors and by DeBiasio and Nelsen.
An open conjecture of Erdős states that for every positive integer $k$ there is a (least) positive integer $f(k)$ so that whenever a tournament has its edges colored with $k$ colors, there exists a set $S$ of at most $f(k)$ vertices so that every vertex has a monochromatic path to some point in $S$. We consider a related question and show that for every (finite or infinite) cardinal $κ>0$ there is a cardinal $ λ_κ$ such that in every $κ$-edge-coloured tournament there exist disjoint vertex sets $K,S$ with total size at most $ λ_κ$ so that every vertex $ v $ has a monochromatic path of length a…
For every $n\in\mathbb{N}$ and $k\geq2$, it is known that every $k$-edge-colouring of the complete graph on $n$ vertices contains a monochromatic connected component of order at least $\frac{n}{k-1}$. For $k\geq3$, it is known that the complete graph can be replaced by a graph $G$ with $δ(G)\geq(1-\varepsilon_k)n$ for some constant $\varepsilon_k$. In this paper, we show that the maximum possible value of $\varepsilon_3$ is $\frac16$. This disproves a conjecture of Gyárfas and Sárközy.
We show that for all $\ell, k, n$ with $\ell \leq k/2$ and $(k-\ell)$ dividing $n$ the following hypergraph-variant of Lehel's conjecture is true. Every $2$-edge-colouring of the $k$-uniform complete hypergraph $\mathcal{K}_n^{(k)}$ on $n$ vertices has at most two disjoint monochromatic $\ell$-cycles in different colours that together cover all but at most $4(k-\ell)$ vertices. If $\ell \leq k/3$, then at most two $\ell$-cycles cover all but at most $2(k-\ell)$ vertices. Furthermore, we can cover all vertices with at most $4$ ($3$ if $\ell\leq k/3$) disjoint monochromatic $\ell$-cycles.
Let $K_{\mathbb{N}}$ be the complete symmetric digraph on the positive integers. Answering a question of DeBiasio and McKenney, we construct a $2$-colouring of the edges of $K_{\mathbb{N}}$ in which every monochromatic path has density~$0$. However, if we restrict the length of monochromatic paths in one colour, then no example as above can exist: We show that every $(r+1)$-edge-coloured complete symmetric digraph (of arbitrary infinite cardinality) containing no directed paths of edge-length $\ell_i$ for any colour $i\leq r$ can be covered by $\prod_{i\leq r} \ell_i$ pairwise disjoint monochr…
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 {\em 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 $r$-unif…
An edge colouring of a graph is said to be an $r$-local colouring if the edges incident to any vertex are coloured with at most $r$ colours. Generalising a result of Bessy and Thomassé, we prove that the vertex set of any $2$-locally coloured complete graph may be partitioned into two disjoint monochromatic cycles of different colours. Moreover, for any natural number $r$, we show that the vertex set of any $r$-locally coloured complete graph may be partitioned into $O(r^2 \log r)$ disjoint monochromatic cycles. This generalises a result of Erdős, Gyárfás and Pyber.
The upper density of an infinite graph $G$ with $V(G) \subseteq \mathbb{N}$ is defined as $\overline{d}(G) = \limsup_{n \rightarrow \infty}{|V(G) \cap \{1,\ldots,n\}|}/{n}$. Let $K_{\mathbb{N}}$ be the infinite complete graph with vertex set $\mathbb{N}$. Corsten, DeBiasio, Lamaison and Lang showed that in every $2$-edge-colouring of $K_{\mathbb{N}}$, there exists a monochromatic path with upper density at least $(12 + \sqrt{8})/17$, which is best possible. In this paper, we extend this result to $k$-edge-colouring of $K_{\mathbb{N}}$ for $k \ge 3$. We conjecture that every $k$-edge-coloured $…
A conjecture of Erdős, Gyárfás, and Pyber says that in any edge-colouring of a complete graph with r colours, it is possible to cover all the vertices with r vertex-disjoint monochromatic cycles. So far, this conjecture has been proven only for r = 2. In this paper we show that in fact this conjecture is false for all r > 2. In contrast to this, we show that in any edge-colouring of a complete graph with three colours, it is possible to cover all the vertices with three vertex-disjoint monochromatic paths, proving a particular case of a conjecture due to Gyárfás. As an intermediate result we s…
Let the diameter cover number, $D^t_r(G)$, denote the least integer $d$ such that under any $r$-coloring of the edges of the graph $G$, there exists a collection of $t$ monochromatic subgraphs of diameter at most $d$ such that every vertex of $G$ is contained in at least one of the subgraphs. We explore the diameter cover number with two colors and two subgraphs when $G$ is a complete multipartite graph with at least three parts. We determine exactly the value of $D_2^2(G)$ for all complete tripartite graphs $G$, and almost all complete multipartite graphs with more than three parts.
A matching $M$ in a graph $G$ is connected if all the edges of $M$ are in the same component of $G$. Following Łuczak,there have been many results using the existence of large connected matchings in cluster graphs with respect to regular partitions of large graphs to show the existence of long paths and other structures in these graphs. We prove exact Ramsey-type bounds on the sizes of monochromatic connected matchings in $2$-edge-colored multipartite graphs. In addition, we prove a stability theorem for such matchings.
Given an $r$-edge-coloured complete graph $K_n$, how many monochromatic connected components does one need in order to cover its vertex set? This natural question is a well-known essentially equivalent formulation of the classical Ryser's conjecture which, despite a lot of attention over the last 50 years, still remains open. A number of recent papers consider a sparse random analogue of this question, asking for the minimum number of monochromatic components needed to cover the vertex set of an $r$-edge-coloured random graph $\mathcal{G}(n,p)$. Recently, Bucić, Korándi and Sudakov established…
A classical result of Erdős, Gyárfás and Pyber states that any $r$-edge-coloured complete graph has a partition into $O(r^2 \log r)$ monochromatic cycles. Here we determine the minimum degree threshold for this property. More precisely, we show that there exists a constant $c$ such that any $r$-edge-coloured graph on $n$ vertices with minimum degree at least $n/2 + c \cdot r \log n$ has a partition into $O(r^2)$ monochromatic cycles. We also provide constructions showing that the minimum degree condition and the number of cycles are essentially tight.
Erdős, Gyárfás and Pyber showed that every $r$-edge-coloured complete graph $K_n$ can be covered by $25 r^2 \log r$ vertex-disjoint monochromatic cycles (independent of $n$). Here, we extend their result to the setting of binomial random graphs. That is, we show that if $p = p(n) = Ω(n^{-1/(2r)})$, then with high probability any $r$-edge-coloured $G(n,p)$ can be covered by at most $1000 r^4 \log r $ vertex-disjoint monochromatic cycles. This answers a question of Korándi, Mousset, Nenadov, Škorić and Sudakov.
We (re-)prove that in every 3-edge-coloured tournament in which no vertex is incident with all colours there is either a cyclic rainbow triangle or a vertex dominating every other vertex monochromatically.
We solve four similar problems: For every fixed $s$ and large $n$, we describe all values of $n_1,\ldots,n_s$ such that for every $2$-edge-coloring of the complete $s$-partite graph $K_{n_1,\ldots,n_s}$ there exists a monochromatic (i) cycle $C_{2n}$ with $2n$ vertices, (ii) cycle $C_{\geq 2n}$ with at least $2n$ vertices, (iii) path $P_{2n}$ with $2n$ vertices, and (iv) path $P_{2n+1}$ with $2n+1$ vertices. This implies a generalization for large $n$ of the conjecture by Gyárfás, Ruszinkó, Sárkőzy and Szemerédi that for every $2$-edge-coloring of the complete $3$-partite graph $K_{n,n,n}$ the…
Consider the following problem. In a school with three classes containing $n$ students each, given that their genders are unknown, find the minimum possible number of triples of same-gender students not all of which are from the same class. Muaengwaeng asked this question and conjectured that the minimum scenario occurs when the classes are all boy, all girl and half-and-half. In this paper, we solve many generalizations of the problem including when the school has more than three classes, when triples are replaced by groups of larger sizes, when the classes are of different sizes, and when ge…
Answering a question raised by Dudek and Prałat, we show that if $pn\rightarrow \infty$, w.h.p.,~whenever $G=G(n,p)$ is $2$-coloured, there exists a monochromatic path of length $n(2/3+o(1))$. This result is optimal in the sense that $2/3$ cannot be replaced by a larger constant. As part of the proof we obtain the following result which may be of independent interest. We show that given a graph $G$ on $n$ vertices with at least $(1-ε)\binom{n}{2}$ edges, whenever $G$ is $2$-edge-coloured, there is a monochromatic path of length at least $(2/3-100\sqrtε)n$. This is an extension of the classical…
Bousquet, Lochet and Thomassé recently gave an elegant proof that for any integer $n$, there is a least integer $f(n)$ such that any tournament whose arcs are coloured with $n$ colours contains a subset of vertices $S$ of size $f(n)$ with the property that any vertex not in $S$ admits a monochromatic path to some vertex of $S$. In this note we provide a lower bound on the value $f(n)$.
Superlinear Lower Bounds for Monochromatic Path Partitions
School of Mathematics, Shandong University（山东大学数学学院）；Extremal Combinatorics and Probability Group (ECOPRO), Institute for Basic Science (IBS)（基础科学研究院极值组合与概率研究组）；School of Mathematics, Nanjing University（南京大学数学系）
Extending a result of Rado to hypergraphs, we prove that for all $s, k, t \in \mathbb{N}$ with $k \geq t \geq 2$, the vertices of every $r = s(k-t+1)$-edge-coloured countably infinite complete $k$-graph can be partitioned into the cores of at most $s$ monochromatic $t$-tight Berge-paths of different colours. We further describe a construction showing that this result is best possible.
We show that for any $2$-local colouring of the edges of the balanced complete bipartite graph $K_{n,n}$, its vertices can be covered with at most~$3$ disjoint monochromatic paths. And, we can cover almost all vertices of any complete or balanced complete bipartite $r$-locally coloured graph with $O(r^2)$ disjoint monochromatic cycles.\\ We also determine the $2$-local bipartite Ramsey number of a path almost exactly: Every $2$-local colouring of the edges of $K_{n,n}$ contains a monochromatic path on $n$ vertices.
A well-known result by Haxell and Kohayakawa states that the vertices of an $r$-coloured complete graph can be partitioned into $r$ monochromatic connected subgraphs of distinct colours; this is a slightly weaker variant of a conjecture by Erdős, Pyber and Gyárfás that states that there exists a partition into $r-1$ monochromatic connected subgraphs. We consider a variant of this problem, where the complete graph is replaced by a graph with large minimum degree, and prove two conjectures of Bal and DeBiasio, for two and three colours.
Suppose that $\mathbb{F}_p$ is coloured with $r$ colours. Then there is some colour class containing at least $c_r p^2$ quadruples of the form $(x, y , x + y, xy)$.
We prove that for any $r\in \mathbb{N}$, there exists a constant $C_r$ such that the following is true. Let $\mathcal{F}=\{F_1,F_2,\dots\}$ be an infinite sequence of bipartite graphs such that $|V(F_i)|=i$ and $Δ(F_i)\leq Δ$ hold for all $i$. Then in any $r$-edge coloured complete graph $K_n$, there is a collection of at most $\exp(C_rΔ)$ monochromatic subgraphs, each of which is isomorphic to an element of $\mathcal{F}$, whose vertex sets partition $V(K_n)$. This proves a conjecture of Corsten and Mendonça in a strong form and generalizes results on the multicolour Ramsey numbers of bounded-…
Let $G$ be a graph whose edges are coloured with $k$ colours, and $\mathcal H=(H_1,\dots , H_k)$ be a $k$-tuple of graphs. A monochromatic $\mathcal H$-decomposition of $G$ is a partition of the edge set of $G$ such that each part is either a single edge or forms a monochromatic copy of $H_i$ in colour $i$, for some $1\le i\le k$. Let $ϕ_{k}(n,\mathcal H)$ be the smallest number $ϕ$, such that, for every order-$n$ graph and every $k$-edge-colouring, there is a monochromatic $\mathcal H$-decomposition with at most $ϕ$ elements. Extending the previous results of Liu and Sousa ["Monochromatic $K_…
How many monochromatic paths, cycles or general trees does one need to cover all vertices of a given $r$-edge-coloured graph $G$? These problems were introduced in the 1960s and were intensively studied by various researchers over the last 50 years. In this paper, we establish a connection between this problem and the following natural Helly-type question in hypergraphs. Roughly speaking, this question asks for the maximum number of vertices needed to cover all the edges of a hypergraph $H$ if it is known that any collection of a few edges of $H$ has a small cover. We obtain quite accurate bou…
One of the most interesting new developments in hypergraph colourings in these last few years has been Voloshin's notion of colourings of mixed hypergraphs. In this paper we shall study a specific instance of Voloshin's idea: a non-monochromatic non-rainbow (NMNR) colouring of a hypergraph is a colouring of its vertices such that every edge has at least two vertices coloured with different colours (non-monochromatic) and no edge has all of its vertices coloured with distinct colours (non-rainbow). Perhaps the most intriguing phenomenon of such colourings is that a hypergraph can have gaps in i…
