For a graph property $\mathcal{P}$ and a common vertex set $V = \{1, 2, \ldots, n\}$, a family of graphs on $V$ is \emph{$\mathcal{P}$-intersecting} iff $G \cap H$ satisfies $\mathcal{P}$ for all $G,H$ in the family. Addressing a question of Chung, Graham, Frankl, and Shearer, we explore---for various $\mathcal{P}$---the maximum cardinality among all $\mathcal{P}$-intersecting families of graphs. In the connected-intersecting case, we resolve the question completely by a short linear algebraic proof showing this maximum is attained by taking all graphs containing a fixed spanning tree (though we show other extremal constructions as well). We also present a new lower bound for containing unions of a fixed subgraph.
Intersecting and cross-intersecting families usually appear in extremal combinatorics in the vein of the Erd{\H o}s--Ko--Rado theorem. On the other hand, P.~Erd{\H o}s and L.~Lov{á}sz in the noted paper~\cite{EL} posed problems on coloring intersecting families as a restriction of classical hypergraph coloring problems to a special class of hypergraphs. This note deals with the mentioned coloring problems stated for cross-intersecting families.
Using the Filmus-Golubev-Lifshitz method to bound the independence number of a hypergraph, we solve some problems concerning multiply intersecting families with biased measure. Among other results we obtain a stability result of a measure version of the Erdos-Ko-Rado theorem for multiply intersecting families.
Guo and Xu determined the maximum size of intersecting families over finite affine spaces and showed that any family reaches maximum size must be trivial. In this paper, we characterize non-trivial intersecting family with maximum size.
In this paper, by shifting technique we study $t$-intersecting families for direct products where the ground set is divided into several parts. Assuming the size of each part is sufficiently large, we determine all extremal $t$-intersecting families for direct products. We also prove that every largest $t$-intersecting subfamily of a more general family introduced by Katona is trivial under certain conditions.
Let $n=2k+1$ be odd with $k\geq3$. In this note, we give two intersecting families with diversity larger than $\sum_{i=k+1}^{2k} \binom {2k}{i}$, which disprove a conjecture of Huang.
Bernáth and Gerbner in 2007 introduced $(p,q)$-chain intersecting families of subsets of an $n$-element underlying set. Those have the property that for any $p$-chain $A_1\subsetneq A_2\subsetneq \dots \subsetneq A_p$ and $q$-chain $B_1\subsetneq B_2\subsetneq \dots \subsetneq B_q$, we have $A_p\cap B_q\neq \emptyset$. Bernáth and Gerbner determined the largest cardinality of such families. They also introduced strongly $(p,q)$-chain intersecting families, where $A_p\cap B_1\neq \emptyset$ and totally $(p,q)$-chain intersecting families, where $A_1\cap B_1\neq \emptyset$. They obtained some pa…
Let $\mathcal{A}\subseteq{[n]\choose a}$ and $\mathcal{B}\subseteq{[n]\choose b}$ be two families of subsets of $[n]$, we say $\mathcal{A}$ and $\mathcal{B}$ are cross-intersecting if $A\cap B\neq \emptyset$ for all $A\in\mathcal{A}$, $B\in\mathcal{B}$. In this paper, we study cross-intersecting families in the multi-part setting. By characterizing the independent sets of vertex-transitive graphs and their direct products, we determine the sizes and structures of maximum-sized multi-part cross-intersecting families. This generalizes the results of Hilton's and Frankl--Tohushige's on cross-inte…
Let $k\ge d\ge 3$ be fixed. Let $\mathcal{F}$ be a $k$-uniform family on $[n]$. Then $\mathcal{F}$ is $(d,s)$-conditionally intersecting if it does not contain $d$ sets with union of size at most $s$ and empty intersection. Answering a question of Frankl, we present some structural results for families that are $(d,s)$-conditionally intersecting with $s\ge 2k+d-3$, and families that are $(k,2k)$-conditionally intersecting. As applications of our structural results, we present some new proofs to the upper bounds for the size of the following $k$-uniform families on $[n]$. (a) $(d,2k+d-3)$-condi…
In this paper, we describe the structure of maximal non-trivial uniform $t$-intersecting families with large size for finite sets. In the special case when $t=1$, our result gives rise to Kostochka and Mubayi's result in 2017.
Let $V$ be an $n$-dimensional vector space over a finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$. In this paper we describe the structure of maximal non-trivial $t$-intersecting families of $k$-dimensional subspaces of $V$ with large size. We also determine the non-trivial $t$-intersecting families with maximum size. In the special case when $t=1$ our result gives rise to the well-known Hilton-Milner Theorem for vector spaces.
A collection of sets is {\em intersecting} if every two members have nonempty intersection. We describe the structure of intersecting families of $r$-sets of an $n$-set whose size is quite a bit smaller than the maximum ${n-1 \choose r-1}$ given by the Erd\H os-Ko-Rado Theorem. In particular, this extends the Hilton-Milner theorem on nontrivial intersecting families and answers a recent question of Han and Kohayakawa for large $n$. In the case $r=3$ we describe the structure of all intersecting families with more than 10 edges. We also prove a stability result for the Erdos matching problem. O…
For a family $\mathcal{F}$ of subsets of $\{1,2,\ldots,n\}$, let $\mathcal{D}(\mathcal{F}) = \{F\setminus G: F, G \in \mathcal{F}\}$ be the collection of all (setwise) differences of $\mathcal{F}$. The family $\mathcal{F}$ is called a $t$-intersecting family, if for some positive integer $t$ and any two members $F, G \in \mathcal{F}$ we have $|F\cap G| \geq t$. The family $\mathcal{F}$ is simply called intersecting if $t=1$. Recently, Frankl proved an upper bound on the size of $\mathcal{D}(\mathcal{F})$ for the intersecting families $\mathcal{F}$. In this note we extend the result of Frankl t…
The profile vector of a family $\mathcal{F}$ of subsets of an $n$-element set is $(f_0,f_1, \ldots, f_n)$ where $f_i$ denotes the number of the $i$-element members of $\mathcal{F}$. In this paper we determine the extreme points of the set of profile vectors for the class of non-trivial intersecting families.
O. Einstein (2008) proved Bollobás-type theorems on intersecting families of ordered sets of finite sets and subspaces. Unfortunately, we report that the proof of a theorem on ordered sets of subspaces had a mistake. We prove two weaker variants.
We consider families of k-subsets of the standard n-set. Two families F, G are said to be cross-intersecting if every member of F has non-empty intersection with every member of G. A family is called non-trivial if the intersection of all its members is empty. Supposing that F and G are non-trivial and cross-intersecting, we determine the maximum of |F|+|G|. For the proof a strengthened version of the so-called shifting technique is introduced. The corresponding problem for families of different uniformities is solved as well.
Given integers $r\geq 2$ and $n,t\geq 1$ we call families $\mathcal{F}_1,\dots,\mathcal{F}_r\subseteq\mathscr{P}([n])$ $r$-cross $t$-intersecting if for all $F_i\in\mathcal{F}_i$, $i\in[r]$, we have $\vert\bigcap_{i\in[r]}F_i\vert\geq t$. We obtain a strong generalisation of the classic Hilton-Milner theorem on cross intersecting families. In particular, we determine the maximum of $\sum_{j\in [r]}\vert\mathcal{F}_j\vert$ for $r$-cross $t$-intersecting families in the cases when these are $k$-uniform families or arbitrary subfamilies of $\mathscr{P}([n])$. Only some special cases of these resu…
Ellis, Friedgut and Pilpel proved that for large enough $n$, a $t$-intersecting family of permutations contains at most $(n-t)!$ permutations. Their main theorem also states that equality holds only for $t$-cosets. We show that their proof of the characterization of extremal families is wrong. However, the characterization follows from a paper of Ellis, as mentioned already by Ellis, Friedgut and Pilpel.
Denote the collection of all $k$-flats in $AG(n,\mathbb{F}_q)$ by $\mathscr{M}(k,n)$. Let $\mathscr{F}_1\subset\mathscr{M}(k_1,n)$ and $\mathscr{F}_2\subset\mathscr{M}(k_2,n)$ satisfy $\dim(F_1\cap F_2)\ge t$ for any $F_1\in\mathscr{F}_1$ and $F_2\in\mathscr{F}_2$. We say they are cross $t$-intersecting families. Moreover, we say they are trivial if each member of them contains a fixed $t$-flats in $AG(n,\mathbb{F}_q)$. In this paper, we show that cross $t$-intersecting families with maximum product of sizes are trivial. We also describe the structure of non-trivial $t$-intersecting families w…
We say a family of sets is intersecting if any two of its sets intersect, and we say it is trivially intersecting if there is an element which appears in every set of the family. In this paper we study the maximum size of a non-trivially intersecting family in a natural "multi-part" setting. Here the ground set is divided into parts, and one considers families of sets whose intersection with each part is of a prescribed size. Our work is motivated by classical results in the single-part setting due to Erdős, Ko and Rado, and Hilton and Milner, and by a theorem of Frankl concerning intersecting…
We consider a problem of maximizing the product of the sizes of two uniform cross-$t$-intersecting families of sets. We show that the value of this maximum is at most polynomially larger (in the size of a ground set) than a quantity conjectured by Hirschorn in 2008. At the same time, we observe that it can be strictly bigger.
The extremal problems regarding the maximum possible size of intersecting families of various combinatorial objects have been extensively studied. In this paper, we investigate supersaturation extensions, which in this context ask for the minimum number of disjoint pairs that must appear in families larger than the extremal threshold. We study the minimum number of disjoint pairs in families of permutations and in $k$-uniform set families, and determine the structure of the optimal families. Our main tool is a removal lemma for disjoint pairs. We also determine the typical structure of $k$-uni…
Two sets $\mathscr{A}$ and $\mathscr{B}$ are said to be cross-intersecting if $X\cap Y\neq\emptyset$ for all $X\in\mathscr{A}$ and $Y\in\mathscr{B}$. Given two cross-intersecting Sperner families (or antichains) $\mathscr{A}$ and $\mathscr{B}$ of $\mathbb{N}_n$, we prove that $|\mathscr{A}|+|\mathscr{B}|\le 2{{n}\choose{\lceil{n/2}\rceil}}$ if $n$ is odd, and $|\mathscr{A}|+|\mathscr{B}|\le {{n}\choose{n/2}}+{{n}\choose{(n/2)+1}}$ if $n$ is even. Furthermore, all extremal and almost-extremal families for $\mathscr{A}$ and $\mathscr{B}$ are determined.
A family $\mathcal{A}$ of sets is said to be intersecting if every two sets in $\mathcal{A}$ intersect. Two families $\mathcal{A}$ and $\mathcal{B}$ are said to be cross-intersecting if each set in $\mathcal{A}$ intersects each set in $\mathcal{B}$. For a positive integer $n$, let $[n] = \{1, \dots, n\}$ and $\mathcal{S}_n = \{A \subseteq [n] \colon 1 \in A\}$. In this note, we extend the Erdős-Ko-Rado Theorem by showing that if $\mathcal{A}$ and $\mathcal{B}$ are non-empty cross-intersecting families of subsets of $[n]$, $\mathcal{A}$ is intersecting, and $a_0, a_1, \dots, a_n, b_0, b_1, \dot…
Mubayi's Conjecture states that if $\mathcal{F}$ is a family of $k$-sized subsets of $[n] = \{1,\ldots,n\}$ which, for $k \geq d \geq 2$, satisfies $A_1 \cap\cdots\cap A_d \neq \emptyset$ whenever $|A_1 \cup\cdots\cup A_d| \leq 2k$ for all distinct sets $A_1,\ldots,A_d \in\mathcal{F}$, then $|\mathcal{F}|\leq \binom{n-1}{k-1}$, with equality occurring only if $\mathcal{F}$ is the family of all $k$-sized subsets containing some fixed element. This paper proves that Mubayi's Conjecture is true for all families that are invariant with respect to shifting; indeed, these families satisfy a stronger…
Let $\mathscr{P}$ be a symplectic polar space over a finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$, and $\mathscr{P}_m$ denote the set of all $m$-dimensional subspaces in $\mathscr{P}$. We say a $t$-intersecting subfamily of $\mathscr{P}_m$ is trivial if there exists a $t$-dimensional subspace contained in each member of this family. In this paper, we determine the structure of maximum sized non-trivial $t$-intersecting subfamilies of $\mathscr{P}_m$.
For positive integers $n$ and $r$ such that $r \leq \lfloor n/2\rfloor$, let $X$ be a set of $n$ elements and let $\binom{X}{r}$ be the family of all $r$-subsets of $X$. Two sub-families $\mathcal{A}$ and $\mathcal{B}$ of $\binom{X}{r}$ are called cross intersecting if $A \cap B \neq \emptyset$ for all $A \in \mathcal{A}$ and $B \in \mathcal{B}$. One of main tools in the study of extremal set theory, and cross intersecting families in particular, is compression operation. In this paper, we give an example of cross intersecting families $\mathcal{A}$ and $\mathcal{B}$ that the compression opera…
Let $V$ be an $n$-dimensional vector space over the finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$, and ${V\brack k}$ denote the family of all $k$-dimensional subspaces of $V$. The families $\mathcal{F}_1\subseteq{V\brack k_1},\mathcal{F}_2\subseteq{V\brack k_2},\ldots,\mathcal{F}_r\subseteq{V\brack k_r}$ are said to be $r$-cross $t$-intersecting if $\dim(F_1\cap F_2\cap\cdots\cap F_r)\geq t$ for all $F_i\in\mathcal{F}_i,\ 1\leq i\leq r.$ The $r$-cross $t$-intersecting families $\mathcal{F}_1$, $\mathcal{F}_2,\ldots,\mathcal{F}_r$ are said to be non-trivial if $\dim(\cap_{1\leq i\leq r}\cap_{F\in\mathcal{F}_i}F)…
For positive integers $n,r,k$ with $n\ge r$ and $k\ge2$, a set $\{(x_1,y_1),(x_2,y_2),\dots,(x_r,y_r)\}$ is called a $k$-signed $r$-set on $[n]$ if $x_1,\dots,x_r$ are distinct elements of $[n]$ and $y_1\dots,y_r\in[k]$. We say a $t$-intersecting family consisting of $k$-signed $r$-sets on $[n]$ is trivial if each member of this family contains a fixed $k$-signed $t$-set. In this paper, we determine the structure of large maximal non-trivial $t$-intersecting families. In particular, we characterize the non-trivial $t$-intersecting families with maximum size for $t\ge2$, extending a Hilton-Miln…
In this short note, we address two problems in extremal set theory regarding intersecting families. The first problem is a question posed by Kupavskii: is it true that given two disjoint cross-intersecting families $\mathcal{A}, \mathcal{B} \subset \binom{[n]}{k}$, they must satisfy $\min\{|\mathcal{A}|, |\mathcal{B}|\} \le \frac{1}{2} \binom{n-1}{k-1}$? We give an affirmative answer for $n \ge 2k^2$, and construct families showing that this range is essentially the best one could hope for, up to a constant factor. The second problem is a conjecture of Frankl. It states that for $n \ge 3k$, th…
A perfect matching in the complete graph on $2k$ vertices is a set of edges such that no two edges have a vertex in common and every vertex is covered exactly once. Two perfect matchings are said to be $t$-intersecting if they have at least $t$ edges in common. The main result in this paper is an extension of the famous Erdős-Ko-Rado (EKR) theorem \cite{EKR} to 2-intersecting families of perfect matchings for all values of $k$. Specifically, for $k\geq 3$ a set of 2-intersecting perfect matchings in $K_{2k}$ of maximum size has $(2k-5)(2k-7)\cdots (1)$ perfect matchings.
A family $\mathcal{F}$ of subsets of $\{1,2,\ldots,n\}$ is called a $t$-intersecting family if $|F\cap G| \geq t$ for any two members $F, G \in \mathcal{F}$ and for some positive integer $t$. If $t=1$, then we call the family $\mathcal{F}$ to be intersecting. Define the set $\mathcal{I}(\mathcal{F}) = \{F\cap G: F, G \in \mathcal{F} \text{ and } F \neq G\}$ to be the collection of all distinct intersections of $\mathcal{F}$. Frankl et al. proved an upper bound for the size of $\mathcal{I}(\mathcal{F})$ of intersecting families $\mathcal{F}$ of $k$-subsets of $\{1,2,\ldots,n\}$. Their theorem h…
Let $V$ be an $(n+\ell)$-dimensional vector space over a finite field, and $W$ a fixed $\ell$-dimensional subspace of $V$. Write ${V\brack n,0}$ to be the set of all $n$-dimensional subspaces $U$ of $V$ satisfying $\dim(U\cap W)=0$. A family $\mathcal{F}\subseteq{V\brack n,0}$ is $t$-intersecting if $\dim(A\cap B)\geq t$ for all $A,B\in\mathcal{F}$. A $t$-intersecting family $\mathcal{F}\subseteq{V\brack n,0}$ is called non-trivial if $\dim(\cap_{F\in\mathcal{F}}F)<t$. In this paper, we describe the structure of non-trivial $t$-intersecting families of ${V\brack n,0}$ with large size. In parti…
Let $\mathcal G$ be a family of subsets of an $n$-element set. The family $\mathcal G$ is called $3$-wise $t$-intersecting if the intersection of any three subsets in $\mathcal G$ is of size at least $t$. For a real number $p\in(0,1)$ we define the measure of the family by the sum of $p^{|G|}(1-p)^{n-|G|}$ over all $G\in\mathcal G$. We prove that if $t\geq 15$ and $p\leq 2/(\sqrt{4t+9}-1)$ then $p^t$ is the maximum measure of $3$-wise $t$-intersecting families, and the bound for $p$ is sharp. We also present the corresponding stability result for shifted families.
Let $\mathscr{P}$ be a symplectic polar space over a finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$, and $\mathscr{P}_m$ denote the collection of all $k$-dimensional totally isotropic subspace in $\mathscr{P}$. Let $\mathscr{F}_1\subset\mathscr{P}_{m_1}$ and $\mathscr{F}_2\subset\mathscr{P}_{m_2}$ satisfy $\dim(F_1\cap F_2)\ge t$ for any $F_1\in\mathscr{F}_1$ and $F_2\in\mathscr{F}_2$. We say they are cross $t$-intersecting families. Moreover, we say they are trivial if each member of them contains a fixed $t$-dimensional totally isotropic subspace. In this paper, we show that cross $t$-intersecting families wit…
A family of sets is said to be symmetric if its automorphism group is transitive, and $3$-wise intersecting if any three sets in the family have nonempty intersection. Frankl conjectured in 1981 that if $\mathcal{A}$ is a symmetric $3$-wise intersecting family of subsets of $\{1,2,\dots,n\}$, then $|\mathcal{A}| = o(2^n)$. Here, we give a short proof of Frankl's conjecture using a 'sharp threshold' result of Friedgut and Kalai.
Given an irreducible fraction $\frac{c}{d} \in [0,1]$, a pair $(\mathcal{A},\mathcal{B})$ is called a $\frac{c}{d}$-cross-intersecting pair of $2^{[n]}$ if $\mathcal{A}, \mathcal{B}$ are two families of subsets of $[n]$ such that for every pair $A \in\mathcal{A}$ and $B\in\mathcal{B}$, $|A \cap B|= \frac{c}{d}|B|$. Mathew, Ray, and Srivastava [{\it\small Fractional cross intersecting families, Graphs and Comb., 2019}] proved that $|\mathcal{A}||\mathcal{B}|\le 2^n$ if $(\mathcal{A}, \mathcal{B})$ is a $\frac{c}{d}$-cross-intersecting pair of $2^{[n]}$ and characterized all the pairs $(\mathcal…
Let $f(k,r,s)$ stand for the least number so that if $\cal F$ is an arbitrary $k$-uniform, $L$-intersecting set system, where $|L|=s$, and $\cal F$ has more than $f(k,r,s)$ elements, then $\cal F$ contains a sunflower with $r$ petals. We give an upper bound for $f(k,3,s)$. Let $g(k,r,\ell)$ be the least number so that any $k$-uniform, $\ell$-intersecting set system of more than $g(k,r,\ell)$ sets contains a sunflower with $r$ petals. We give also an upper bound for $g(k,r,\ell)$.
Intersecting families and blocking sets feature prominently in extremal combinatorics. We examine the following generalization of an intersecting family investigated by Hajnal, Rothschild, and others. If $s \geq 1$, $k \geq 2$, and $u \geq 1$ are integers, then say that an $s$-uniform family $\mathcal{F}$ is $(k,u)$-intersecting if for all $A_1, A_2, \cdots, A_k \in \mathcal{F}$, $|A_i \cap A_j| \geq u$ for some $1 \leq i < j \leq k$. In this note, we investigate the following parameter. If $s$, $k$, $u$, $\ell$ are integers satisfying $s \geq 1$, $k \geq 2$, $1 \leq u \leq s$, and $2 \leq \el…
Closed Intersecting Families of finite sets and their applications
Paul Erdés和László Lovász确定任何\emph{maximal intersecting family of $k-$sets}最多有$k^{k}$块。他们提出了在这样的族中找到最大可能块数的问题。他们还表明，存在一个最大的交叉家庭的$k-$集近似$(e-1)k!$块。后来，彼得·弗兰克尔、太田克弘和德重则秀使用了一个非凡的构造来证明至少有$(\frac{k}{2})^{k-1}$块的$k-$集的极大交族的存在性。在这篇文章中，我们介绍了\emph{closed intersecting family of $k-$sets}的概念，并表明，这样的家庭总是可以嵌入在一个最大的交叉家庭的$k-$集。利用这一结果，我们给出了两个反证Frankl等人的一个定理的两个特例的例子，并给出了至少含有$(\frac{k}{2})^{k-1}$块的$k-$集的极大交族的较简单的构造.
