The independence polynomial of a graph $G$, denoted $I(G,x)$, is the generating polynomial for the number of independent sets of each size. The roots of $I(G,x)$ are called the \textit{independence roots} of $G$. It is known that for every graph $G$, the independence root of smallest modulus, denoted $ξ(G)$, is real. The relation $\preceq$ on the set of all graphs is defined as follows, $H\preceq G$ if and only if $I(H,x)\ge I(G,x)\text{ for all }x\in [ξ(G),0].$
We find the maximum and minimum connected unicyclic and connected well-covered unicyclic graphs of a given order with respect to $\preceq$. This extends 2013 work by Csikvári where the maximum and minimum trees of a given order were determined and also answers an open question posed in the same work. Corollaries of our results give the graphs that minimize and maximize $ξ(G)$ among all connected (well-covered) unicyclic graphs. We also answer more related open questions posed by Oboudi in 2018 and disprove a conjecture due to Levit and Mandrescu from 2008.
We characterize unicyclic graphs that are singular using the support of the null space of their pendant trees. From this, we obtain closed formulas for the independence and matching numbers of a unicyclic graph, based on the support of its subtrees. These formulas allows one to compute independence and matching numbers of unicyclic graphs using linear algebra methods.
The spectral radius of a uniform hypergraph is defined to be that of the adjacency tensor the hypergraph. It is known that the unique unicyclic hypergraph with the largest spectral radius is a nonlinear hypergraph, and the unique linear unicyclic hypergraph with the largest spectral radius is a power hypergraph. In this paper we determine the the unique linear unicyclic hypergraph with the second or third largest spectral radius, where the former hypergraph is a power hypergraph and the latter hypergraph is a non-power hypergraph.
The Hosoya index $Z (G)$ of a graph $G$ is defined as the total number of edge independent sets of $G$. In this paper, we extend the research of [J. Ou, On extremal unicyclic molecular graphs with maximal Hosoya index, \textit{Discrete Appl. Math.} 157 (2009) 391--397.] and [Y. Ye, X. Pan, H. Liu, Ordering unicyclic graphs with respect to Hosoya indices and Merrifield-Simmons indices, \textit{MATCH Commun. Math. Comput. Chem.} 59 (2008) 191--202.] and order the largest $n-1$ unicyclic graphs with respect to the Hosoya index.
In this work we obtain basis for the null space of unicyclic graphs. We extend the null decomposition of trees from [11] for unicyclic graphs. As an application, we obtain closed formulas for the independence and matching numbers of unicyclic graphs just using the support of the graph.
For a graph $G$, the signless Laplacian Estrada index is defined as $SLEE(G)=\sum^{n}_{i=1}e^{q^{}_i}$,where $q_1, q_2, \dots, q_n$are the eigenvalues of the signless Laplacian matrix of $G$. In this paper, we first characterize the unicyclic graphs with the first two largest and smallest $SLEE$ and then determine the unique unicyclic graph with maximum $SLEE$ among the unicyclic graphs on $n$ vertices with given diameter.
F-index of a graph is the sum of the cube of the degrees of the vertices. In this paper, we investigate the F-indices of unicyclic graphs by introducing some transformation, and characterize the unicyclic graphs with the first five largest F-indices and the unicyclic graphs with the first two smallest F-indices, respectively.
A set S is independent in a graph G if no two vertices from S are adjacent. By core(G) we mean the intersection of all maximum independent sets. The independence number alpha(G) is the cardinality of a maximum independent set, while mu(G) is the size of a maximum matching in G. A connected graph having only one cycle, say C, is a unicyclic graph. In this paper we prove that if G is a unicyclic graph of order n and n-1 = alpha(G) + mu(G), then core(G) coincides with the union of cores of all trees in G-C.
A set S is independent in a graph G if no two vertices from S are adjacent. The independence number alpha(G) is the cardinality of a maximum independent set, while mu(G) is the size of a maximum matching in G. If alpha(G)+mu(G)=|V|, then G=(V,E) is called a Konig-Egervary graph. The number d_{c}(G)=max{|A|-|N(A)|} is called the critical difference of G (Zhang, 1990). By core(G) (corona(G)) we denote the intersection (union, respectively) of all maximum independent sets, while by ker(G) we mean the intersection of all critical independent sets. A connected graph having only one cycle is called …
For a sequence $d$ of non-negative integers, let ${\cal F}(d)$ be the set of all forests whose degree sequence is $d$. We present closed formulas for $γ_{\max}^{\cal F}(d)=\max\{ γ(F):F\in {\cal F}(d)\}$ and $α_{\min}^{\cal F}(d)=\min\{ α(F):F\in {\cal F}(d)\}$ where $γ(F)$ and $α(F)$ are the domination number and the independence number of a forest $F$, respectively.
The arithmetic-geometric matrix $A_{ag}(G)$ of a graph $G$ is a square matrix, where the $(i,j)$-entry is equal to $\displaystyle \frac{d_{i}+d_{j}}{2\sqrt{d_{i}d_{j}}}$ if the vertices $v_{i}$ and $v_{j}$ are adjacent, and 0 otherwise. The arithmetic-geometric spectral radius of $G$, denoted by $ρ_{ag}(G)$, is the largest eigenvalue of the arithmetic-geometric matrix $A_{ag}(G)$. Let $S_{n}$ be the star of order $n\geq3$ and $S_{n}+e$ be the unicyclic graph obtained from $S_{n}$ by adding an edge. In this paper, we prove that for any tree $T$ of order $n\geq2$, $\displaystyle 2\cos\fracπ{n+1}…
For a sequence $d$ of non-negative integers, let ${\cal G}(d)$ and ${\cal F}(d)$ be the sets of all graphs and forests with degree sequence $d$, respectively. Let $γ_{\min}(d)=\min\{ γ(G):G\in {\cal G}(d)\}$, $α_{\max}(d)=\max\{ α(G):G\in {\cal G}(d)\}$, $γ_{\min}^{\cal F}(d)=\min\{ γ(F):F\in {\cal F}(d)\}$, and $α_{\max}^{\cal F}(d)=\max\{ α(F):F\in {\cal F}(d)\}$ where $γ(G)$ is the domination number and $α(G)$ is the independence number of a graph $G$. Adapting results of Havel and Hakimi, Rao showed in 1979 that $α_{\max}(d)$ can be determined in polynomial time. We establish the existence…
An independent broadcast on a connected graph $G$ is a function $f:V(G)\to \mathbb{N}_0$ such that, for every vertex $x$ of $G$, the value $f(x)$ is at most the eccentricity of $x$ in $G$, and $f(x)>0$ implies that $f(y)=0$ for every vertex $y$ of $G$ within distance at most $f(x)$ from $x$. The broadcast independence number $α_b(G)$ of $G$ is the largest weight $\sum\limits_{x\in V(G)}f(x)$ of an independent broadcast $f$ on $G$. Clearly, $α_b(G)$ is at least the independence number $α(G)$ for every connected graph $G$. Our main result implies $α_b(G)\leq 4α(G)$. We prove a tight inequality a…
A bi-hole of size $t$ in a bipartite graph $G$ is a copy of $K_{t,t}$ in the bipartite complement of $G$. Given an $n \times n$ bipartite graph $G$, let $β(G)$ be the largest $k$ for which $G$ has a bi-hole of size $k$. We prove that \[ β(G) \geq \left \lfloor \frac{1}{2} \cdot \sum_{v \in V(G)} \frac{1}{d(v)+1} \right \rfloor. \] Furthermore, we prove the following generalization of the result above. Given an $n \times n$ bipartite graph $G$, Let $β_d(G)$ be the largest $k$ for which $G$ has a $k \times k$ $d$-degenerate subgraph. We prove that \[ β_d(G) \geq \left \lfloor \frac{1}{2} \cdot \…
We consider a natural, yet seemingly not much studied, extremal problem in bipartite graphs. A bi-hole of size $t$ in a bipartite graph $G$ is a copy of $K_{t, t}$ in the bipartite complement of $G$. Let $f(n, Δ)$ be the largest $k$ for which every $n \times n$ bipartite graph with maximum degree $Δ$ in one of the parts has a bi-hole of size $k$. Determining $f(n, Δ)$ is thus the bipartite analogue of finding the largest independent set in graphs with a given number of vertices and bounded maximum degree. Our main result determines the asymptotic behavior of $f(n, Δ)$. More precisely, we show …
Let $G$ be a graph with adjacency matrix $A(G)$ and degree diagonal matrix $D (G)$. In 2017, Nikiforov [Appl. Anal. Discrete Math., 11 (2017) 81--107] defined the matrix $A_α(G) = αD(G) + (1-α)A(G)$ for any real $α\in[0,1]$. The largest eigenvalue of $A(G)$ is called the spectral radius of $G$, while the largest eigenvalue of $A_α(G)$ is called the $A_α$ spectral radius of $G$. Let $\mathcal{G}_{n,i}$ be the set of graphs of order $n$ with independence number $i$. Recently, for all graphs in $\mathcal{G}_{n,i}$ having the minimum or the maximum $A$, $Q$ and $A_α$ spectral radius where $i\in\{1…
Let G be a graph on n vertices in which every induced subgraph on s=\log^3 n vertices has an independent set of size at least t=\log n. What is the largest q=q(n) so that every such G must contain an independent set of size at least q ? This is one of several related questions raised by Erdos and Hajnal. We show that q(n)=Θ(\log^2 n/\log \log n), investigate the more general problem obtained by changing the parameters s and t, and discuss the connection to a related Ramsey-type problem.
The independence number $α(G)$ and the dissociation number ${\rm diss}(G)$ of a graph $G$ are the largest orders of induced subgraphs of $G$ of maximum degree at most $0$ and at most $1$, respectively. We consider possible improvements of the obvious inequality $2α(G)\geq {\rm diss}(G)$. For connected cubic graphs $G$ distinct from $K_4$, we show $5α(G)\geq 3{\rm diss}(G)$, and describe the rich and interesting structure of the extremal graphs in detail. For bipartite graphs, and, more generally, triangle-free graphs, we also obtain improvements. For subcubic graphs though, the inequality cann…
An independent broadcast on a connected graph $G$ is a function $f:V(G)\to \mathbb{N}_0$ such that, for every vertex $x$ of $G$, the value $f(x)$ is at most the eccentricity of $x$ in $G$, and $f(x)>0$ implies that $f(y)=0$ for every vertex $y$ of $G$ within distance at most $f(x)$ from $x$. The broadcast independence number $α_b(G)$ of $G$ is the largest weight $\sum\limits_{x\in V(G)}f(x)$ of an independent broadcast $f$ on $G$. We describe an efficient algorithm that determines the broadcast independence number of a given tree. Furthermore, we show NP-hardness of the broadcast independence …
Let $G$ be a simple graph of order $n$. An independent set in a graph is a set of pairwise non-adjacent vertices. The independence polynomial of $G$ is the polynomial $I(G,x)=\sum_{k=0}^{n} s(G,k) x^{k}$, where $s(G,k)$ is the number of independent sets of $G$ of size $k$ and $s(G,0)=1$. Clearly all real roots of $I(G,x)$ are negative. Let $ξ(G)$ be the largest real root of $I(G,x)$. Let $H$ be a simple graph. By $G \succeq H$ we mean that $I(H,x)\geq I(G,x)$ for every $x$ in the interval $[ξ(G),0]$. We note that $G\succeq H$ implies that $ξ(G)\geq ξ(H)$. Also we let $G\succ H$ if and only if …
The regular independence number, introduced by Albertson and Boutin in 1990, is the size of a largest set of independent vertices with the same degree. Lower bounds were proven for this invariant, in terms of the order, for trees and planar graphs. In this article, we generalize and extend these results to find lower bounds for the regular $k$-independence number for trees, forests, planar graphs, $k$-trees and $k$-degenerate graphs.
An independent broadcast on a connected graph $G$ is a function $f:V(G)\to \mathbb{N}_0$ such that, for every vertex $x$ of $G$, the value $f(x)$ is at most the eccentricity of $x$ in $G$, and $f(x)>0$ implies that $f(y)=0$ for every vertex $y$ of $G$ within distance at most $f(x)$ from $x$. The broadcast independence number $α_b(G)$ of $G$ is the largest weight $\sum\limits_{x\in V(G)}f(x)$ of an independent broadcast $f$ on $G$. It is known that $α(G)\leq α_b(G)\leq 4α(G)$ for every connected graph $G$, where $α(G)$ is the independence number of $G$. If $G$ has girth $g$ and minimum degree $…
Let $G$ be a graph and $v$ any vertex of $G$. We define the degenerate degree of $v$, denoted by $ζ(v)$ as $ζ(v)={\max}_{H: v\in H}~δ(H)$, where the maximum is taken over all subgraphs of $G$ containing the vertex $v$. We show that the degenerate degree sequence of any graph can be determined by an efficient algorithm. A $k$-independent set in $G$ is any set $S$ of vertices such that $Δ(G[S])\leq k$. The largest cardinality of any $k$-independent set is denoted by $α_k(G)$. For $k\in \{1, 2, 3\}$, we prove that $α_{k-1}(G)\geq {\sum}_{v\in G} \min \{1, 1/(ζ(v)+(1/k))\}$. Using the concept of c…
The independence number of a hypergraph H is the size of a largest set of vertices containing no edge of H. In this paper, we prove new sharp bounds on the independence number of n-vertex (r+1)-uniform hypergraphs in which every r-element set is contained in at most d edges, where 0 < d < n/(log n)^{3r^2}. Our relatively short proof extends a method due to Shearer. We give an application to hypergraph Ramsey numbers involving independent neighborhoods.
Given a graph $G$, the adjacency matrix and degree diagonal matrix of $G$ are denoted by $A(G)$ and $D(G)$, respectively. In 2017, Nikiforov \cite{0007} proposed the $A_α$-matrix: $A_α(G)=αD(G)+(1-α)A(G),$ where $α\in [0, 1]$. The largest eigenvalue of this novel matrix is called the $A_α$-index of $G$. In this paper, we characterize the graphs with minimum $A_α$-index among $n$-vertex graphs with independence number $i$ for $α\in[0,1)$, where $i=1,\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\rfloor,\lceil\frac{n}{2}\rceil,{\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\rfloor+1},n-3,n-2,n-1,$ whereas for $i=2$ we consider the same problem for $α…
Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava（布拉迪斯拉发斯洛伐克理工大学）；University of Split（斯普利特大学）；University of Novo mesto（新梅斯托大学）；University of Ljubljana（卢布尔雅那大学）；Rudolfovo – Science and Technology Centre Novo mesto（Rudolfovo——新梅斯托科学与技术中心）
If $A$ is an independent set of a graph $G$ such that the vertices in $A$ have different degrees, then we call $A$ an irregular independent set of $G$. If $D$ is a dominating set of $G$ such that the vertices that are not in $D$ have different numbers of neighbours in $D$, then we call $D$ an irregular dominating set of $G$. The size of a largest irregular independent set of $G$ and the size of a smallest irregular dominating set of $G$ are denoted by $α_{ir}(G)$ and $γ_{ir}(G)$, respectively. We initiate the investigation of these two graph parameters. For each of them, we obtain sharp bounds…
A new notion of vertex independence and rank for a finite graph G is introduced. The independence of vertices is based on the boolean independence of columns of a natural boolean matrix associated to G. Rank is the cardinality of the largest set of independent columns. Some basic properties and some more advanced theorems are proved. Geometric properties of the graph are related to its rank and independent sets.
The Hadwiger number of a graph $G$, denoted $h(G)$, is the largest integer $t$ such that $G$ contains $K_t$ as a minor. A famous conjecture due to Hadwiger in 1943 states that for every graph $G$, $h(G) \ge χ(G)$, where $χ(G)$ denotes the chromatic number of $G$. Let $α(G)$ denote the independence number of $G$. A graph is $H$-free if it does not contain the graph $H$ as an induced subgraph. In 2003, Plummer, Stiebitz and Toft proved that $h(G) \ge χ(G)$ for all $H$-free graphs $G$ with $α(G) \le 2$, where $H$ is any graph on four vertices with $α(H) \le 2$, $H=C_5$, or $H$ is a particular gra…
For a connected graph $G$ with order $n$ and an integer $k\geq 1$, we denote by $$S_k(D(G))=λ_1(D(G))+\cdots+λ_k(D(G))$$ the sum of $k$ largest distance eigenvalues of $G$. In this paper, we consider the sharp upper bound and lower bound of $S_k(D(G))$. We determine the sharp lower bounds of $S_k(D(G))$ when $G$ is connected graph and is a tree, respectively, and characterize both the extremal graphs. Moreover, we conjecture that the upper bound is attained when $G$ is a path of order $n$ and prove some partial result supporting the conjecture. To prove our result, we obtain a sharp upper boun…
We investigate the generalized bilinear forms graph $Γ_d$ over a residue class ring $\mathbb{Z}_{p^s}$. We show that $Γ_d$ is a connected vertex transitive graph, and completely determine its independence number, clique number, chromatic number and maximum cliques. We also prove that cores of both $Γ_d$ and its complement are maximum cliques. The graph $Γ_d$ is useful for error-correcting codes. We show that every largest independent set of $Γ_d$ is both an MRD code over $\mathbb{Z}_{p^s}$ and a usual MDS code. Moreover, there is a largest independent set of $Γ_d$ to be a linear code over $\ma…
An $r$-graph $G$ is a pair $(V,E)$ such that $V$ is a set and $E$ is a family of $r$-element subsets of $V$. The \emph{independence number} $α(G)$ of $G$ is the size of a largest subset $I$ of $V$ such that no member of $E$ is a subset of $I$. The \emph{transversal number} $τ(G)$ of $G$ is the size of a smallest subset $T$ of $V$ that intersects each member of $E$. $G$ is said to be \emph{connected} if for every distinct $v$ and $w$ in $V$ there exists a \emph{path} from $v$ to $w$ (that is, a sequence $e_1, \dots, e_p$ of members of $E$ such that $v \in e_1$, $w \in e_p$, and if $p \geq 2$, t…
Consider classical Kneser's graph $K(n,r)$: for two natural numbers $ r, n $ such that $r \le n / 2$, its vertices are all the subsets of $[n]=\{1,2,\ldots,n\}$ of size $r$, and two such vertices are adjacent if the corresponding subsets are disjoint. The Erdős--Ko--Rado theorem states that the size of the largest independent set in this graph is $\binom{n-1}{r-1}$. Now let us delete each edge of the graph $K(n,r)$ with some fixed probability $p$ independently of each other. Quite surprisingly, the independence number of such random subgraph $K_p(n,r)$ of the graph $ K(n,r) $ is, with high pro…
For the Erdős-Rényi random graph G(n,p), we give a precise asymptotic formula for the size of a largest vertex subset in G(n,p) that induces a subgraph with average degree at most t, provided that p = p(n) is not too small and t = t(n) is not too large. In the case of fixed t and p, we find that this value is asymptotically almost surely concentrated on at most two explicitly given points. This generalises a result on the independence number of random graphs. For both the upper and lower bounds, we rely on large deviations inequalities for the binomial distribution.
Let $Γ$ be the graph whose vertices are the chambers of the finite projective space $PG(3,q)$ with two vertices being adjacent when the corresponding chambers are in general position. It is known that the independence number of this graph is $(q^2+q+1)(q+1)^2$. For $q\ge 43$ we determine the largest independent set of $Γ$ and show that every maximal independent set that is not a largest one has at most constant times $q^3$ elements. For $q\ge 47$, this information is then used to show that $Γ$ has chromatic number $q^2+q$. Furthermore, for many families of generalized quadrangles we prove simi…
The odd independence number of graphs, I: Foundations and classical classes
University of Haifa-Oranim（海法奥拉尼姆大学）；Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje（斯库普西里尔和梅托迪乌斯大学）；University of Ljubljana（卢布尔雅那大学）；Faculty of Information Studies in Novo Mesto（新梅斯托信息研究学院）；Rudolfovo - Science and Technology Centre Novo Mesto, FAMNIT, University of Primorska（鲁道夫诺沃梅斯托科学与技术中心，FAMNIT，滨海大学）；Alfréd Rényi Institute of Mathematics（阿尔弗雷德·雷尼数学研究所）；University of Pannonia（潘诺尼亚大学）
We characterize the connected graphs of given order $n$ and given independence number $α$ that maximize the number of maximum independent sets. For $3\leq α\leq n/2$, there is a unique such graph that arises from the disjoint union of $α$ cliques of orders $\left\lceil\frac{n}α\right\rceil$ and $\left\lfloor\frac{n}α\right\rfloor$, by selecting a vertex $x$ in a largest clique and adding an edge between $x$ and a vertex in each of the remaining $α-1$ cliques. Our result confirms a conjecture of Derikvand and Oboudi [On the number of maximum independent sets of graphs, Transactions on Combinato…
