Given a graph $G$, a decomposition of $G$ is a partition of its edges. A graph is $(d, h)$-decomposable if its edge set can be partitioned into a $d$-degenerate graph and a graph with maximum degree at most $h$. For $d \le 4$, we are interested in the minimum integer $h_d$ such that every planar graph is $(d,h_d)$-decomposable. It was known that $h_3 \le 4$, $h_2\le 8$, and $h_1 = \infty$. This paper proves that $h_4=1, h_3=2$, and $4 \le h_2 \le 6$.
The 3-Decomposition Conjecture states that every connected cubic graph can be decomposed into a spanning tree, a 2-regular subgraph and a matching. We show that this conjecture holds for the class of connected plane cubic graphs.
We strengthen a result of Dross, Montassier and Pinlou (2017) that the vertex set of every triangle-free planar graph can be decomposed into a set that induces a forest and a set that induces a forest with maximum degree at most $5$, showing that $5$ can be replaced by $3$.
Refining a classical proof of Whitney, we show that any $4$-connected planar triangulation can be decomposed into a Hamiltonian path and two trees. Therefore, every $4$-connected planar graph decomposes into three forests, one having maximum degree at most $2$. We use this result to show that any Hamiltonian planar triangulation can be decomposed into two trees and one spanning tree of maximum degree at most $3$. These decompositions improve the result of Gonçalves [Covering planar graphs with forests, one having bounded maximum degree. J. Comb. Theory, Ser. B, 100(6):729--739, 2010] that ever…
Tutte has described in the book "Connectivity in graphs" a canonical decomposition of any graph into 3-connected components. In this article we translate (using the language of symbolic combinatorics) Tutte's decomposition into a general grammar expressing any family of graphs (with some stability conditions) in terms of the 3-connected subfamily. A key ingredient we use is an extension of the so-called dissymmetry theorem, which yields negative signs in the grammar. As a main application we recover in a purely combinatorial way the analytic expression found by Giménez and Noy for the series c…
DP-coloring was introduced by Dvořák and Postle as a generalization of list coloring. It was originally used to solve a longstanding conjecture by Borodin, stating that every planar graph without cycles of lengths 4 to 8 is 3-choosable. In this paper, we give three sufficient conditions for a planar graph to be DP-4-colorable. Actually all the results (Theorem 1.3, 1.4 and 1.7) are stated in the ``color extendability'' form, and uniformly proved by vertex identification and discharging method.
We denote by $χ$ g (G) the game chromatic number of a graph G, which is the smallest number of colors Alice needs to win the coloring game on G. We know from Montassier et al. [M. Montassier, P. Ossona de Mendez, A. Raspaud and X. Zhu, Decomposing a graph into forests, J. Graph Theory Ser. B, 102(1):38-52, 2012] and, independantly, from Wang and Zhang, [Y. Wang and Q. Zhang. Decomposing a planar graph with girth at least 8 into a forest and a matching, Discrete Maths, 311:844-849, 2011] that planar graphs with girth at least 8 have game chromatic number at most 5. One can ask if this bound of …
Given a fixed positive integer $k$, the $k$-planar local crossing number of a graph $G$, denoted by $\text{LCR}_k(G)$, is the minimum positive integer $L$ such that $G$ can be decomposed into $k$ subgraphs, each of which can be drawn in a plane such that no edge is crossed more than $L$ times. In this note, we show that under certain natural restrictions, the ratio $\text{LCR}_k(G)/\text{LCR}_1(G)$ is of order $1/k^2$, which is analogous to a recent result of Pach et al. for the $k$-planar crossing number (defined as the minimum positive integer $C$ for which there is a $k$-planar drawing of $…
A graph $G$ is called interval colorable if it has a proper edge coloring with colors $1,2,3,\dots$ such that the colors of the edges incident to every vertex of $G$ form an interval of integers. Not all graphs are interval colorable; in fact, quite few families have been proved to admit interval colorings. In this paper we introduce and investigate a new notion, the interval coloring thickness of a graph $G$, denoted ${θ_{\mathrm{int}}}(G)$, which is the minimum number of interval colorable edge-disjoint subgraphs of $G$ whose union is $G$. Our investigation is motivated by scheduling problem…
An edge-colored graph is said to contain a rainbow-$F$ if it contains $F$ as a subgraph and every edge of $F$ is a distinct color. The problem of maximizing edges among $n$-vertex properly edge-colored graphs not containing a rainbow-$F$, known as the rainbow Turán problem, was initiated by Keevash, Mubayi, Sudakov and Verstraëte. We investigate a variation of this problem with the additional restriction that the graph is planar, and we denote the corresponding extremal number by $\ex_{\p}^*(n,F)$. In particular, we determine $\ex_{\p}^*(n,P_5)$, where $P_5$ denotes the $5$-vertex path.
The only open case of Vizing's conjecture that every planar graph with $Δ\geq 6$ is a class 1 graph is $Δ= 6$. We give a short proof of the following statement: there is no 6-critical plane graph $G$, such that every vertex of $G$ is incident to at most three 3-faces. A stronger statement without restriction to critical graphs is stated in \cite{Wang_Xu_2013}. However, the proof given there works only for critical graphs. Furthermore, we show that every 5-critical plane graph has a 3-face which is adjacent to a $k$-face $(k\in \{3,4\})$. For $Δ= 5$ our result gives insights into the structure …
We settle a problem of Havel by showing that there exists an absolute constant d such that if G is a planar graph in which every two distinct triangles are at distance at least d, then G is 3-colorable. In fact, we prove a more general theorem. Let G be a planar graph, and let H be a set of connected subgraphs of G, each of bounded size, such that every two distinct members of H are at least a specified distance apart and all triangles of G are contained in \bigcup{H}. We give a sufficient condition for the existence of a 3-coloring phi of G such that for every B\in H, the restriction of phi t…
Near-perfect matchings in highly connected 1-planar graphs with a local crossing constraint
College of Mathematics and Statistics, Hunan Normal University（湖南师范大学数学与统计学院）；College of Mathematics and Statistics, Hunan First Normal University（湖南第一师范学院数学与统计学院）
We prove that any planar graph on $n$ vertices has less than $O(5{.}2852^n)$ spanning trees. Under the restriction that the planar graph is 3-connected and contains no triangle and no quadrilateral the number of its spanning trees is less than $O(2{.}7156^n)$. As a consequence of the latter the grid size needed to realize a 3d polytope with integer coordinates can be bounded by $O(147.{7}^n)$. Our observations imply improved upper bounds for related quantities: the number of cycle-free graphs in a planar graph is bounded by $O(6.4884^n)$, the number of plane spanning trees on a set of $n$ poin…
For a fixed simple digraph $F$ and a given simple digraph $D$, an $F$-free $k$-coloring of $D$ is a vertex-coloring in which no induced copy of $F$ in $D$ is monochromatic. We study the complexity of deciding for fixed $F$ and $k$ whether a given simple digraph admits an $F$-free $k$-coloring. Our main focus is on the restriction of the problem to planar input digraphs, where it is only interesting to study the cases $k \in \{2,3\}$. From known results it follows that for every fixed digraph $F$ whose underlying graph is not a forest, every planar digraph $D$ admits an $F$-free $2$-coloring, a…
We consider decomposing a 3-connected planar graph $G$ using laminar separators of size three. We show how to find a maximal set of laminar 3-separators in such a graph in linear time. We also discuss how to find maximal laminar set of 3-separators from special families. For example we discuss non-trivial cuts, ie. cuts which split $G$ into two components of size at least two. For any vertex $v$, we also show how to find a maximal set of 3-separators disjoint from $v$ which are laminar and satisfy: every vertex in a separator $X$ has two neighbours not in the unique component of $G-X$ containi…
A total $k$-coloring of a graph is an assignment of $k$ colors to its vertices and edges such that no two adjacent or incident elements receive the same color. The Total Coloring Conjecture (TCC) states that every simple graph $G$ has a total ($Δ(G)+2$)-coloring, where $Δ(G)$ is the maximum degree of $G$. This conjecture has been confirmed for planar graphs with maximum degree at least 7 or at most 5, i.e., the only open case of TCC is that of maximum degree 6. It is known that every planar graph $G$ of $Δ(G) \geq 9$ or $Δ(G) \in \{7, 8\}$ with some restrictions has a total $(Δ(G) + 1)$-colori…
It is well-known that every maximal planar graph has a matching of size at least $\tfrac{n+8}{3}$ if $n\geq 14$. In this paper, we investigate similar matching-bounds for maximal \emph{1-planar} graphs, i.e., graphs that can be drawn such that every edge has at most one crossing. In particular we show that every 3-connected simple-maximal 1-planar graph has a matching of size at least $\tfrac{2n+6}{5}$; the bound decreases to $\tfrac{3n+14}{10}$ if the graph need not be 3-connected. We also give (weaker) bounds when the graph comes with a fixed 1-planar drawing or is not simple. All our bounds…
We consider the problem of decomposing a given (di)graph into paths of length 2 with the additional restriction that no two such paths may have more than one vertex in common. We establish its NP-hardness by a reduction from 3-SAT, characterize (di)graph classes for which the problem can be be reduced to the Stable-set problem on claw-free graphs and describe a dynamic program for solving it for series-parallel digraphs.
In 1976, Steinberg conjectured that planar graphs without $4$-cycles and $5$-cycles are $3$-colorable. This conjecture attracted numerous researchers for about 40 years, until it was recently disproved by Cohen-Addad et al. (2017). However, coloring planar graphs with restrictions on cycle lengths is still an active area of research, and the interest in this particular graph class remains. Let $G$ be a planar graph without $4$-cycles and $5$-cycles. For integers $d_1$ and $d_2$ satisfying $d_1+d_2\geq8$ and $d_2\geq d_1\geq 2$, it is known that $V(G)$ can be partitioned into two sets $V_1$ and…
We extend the classical LR characterization of chirotopes of finite planar families of points to chirotopes of finite planar families of pairwise disjoint convex bodies: a map \c{hi} on the set of 3-subsets of a finite set I is a chirotope of finite planar families of pairwise disjoint convex bodies if and only if for every 3-, 4-, and 5-subset J of I the restriction of \c{hi} to the set of 3-subsets of J is a chirotope of finite planar families of pairwise disjoint convex bodies. Our main tool is the polarity map, i.e., the map that assigns to a convex body the set of lines missing its interi…
Using the theory of equitable decompositions it is possible to decompose a matrix $M$ appropriately associated with a given graph. The result is a collection of smaller matrices whose collective eigenvalues are the same as the eigenvalues of the original matrix $M$. This is done by decomposing the matrix over a graph symmetry. Previously it was shown that a matrix can be equitably decomposed over any uniform, basic, or separable automorphism. Here we extend this theory to show that it is possible to equitably decompose a matrix over any automorphism of a graph, without restriction. Moreover, w…
Bouchet conjectured in 1983 that every flow-admissible signed graph admits a nowhere-zero 6-flow which is equivalent to the restriction to cubic signed graphs. In this paper, we proved that every flow-admissible $3$-edge-colorable cubic signed graph admits a nowhere-zero $10$-flow. This together with the 4-color theorem implies that every flow-admissible bridgeless planar signed graph admits a nowhere-zero $10$-flow. As a byproduct, we also show that every flow-admissible hamiltonian signed graph admits a nowhere-zero $8$-flow.
Every finite graph admits a \emph{simple (topological) drawing}, that is, a drawing where every pair of edges intersects in at most one point. However, in combination with other restrictions simple drawings do not universally exist. For instance, \emph{$k$-planar graphs} are those graphs that can be drawn so that every edge has at most $k$ crossings (i.e., they admit a \emph{$k$-plane drawing}). It is known that for $k\le 3$, every $k$-planar graph admits a $k$-plane simple drawing. But for $k\ge 4$, there exist $k$-planar graphs that do not admit a $k$-plane simple drawing. Answering a questi…
Barnette's conjecture is an unsolved problem in graph theory. The problem states that every 3-regular (cubic), 3-connected, planar, bipartite (Barnette) graph is Hamiltonian. Partial results have been derived with restrictions on number of vertices, several properties of face-partitions and dual graphs of Barnette graphs while some studies focus just on structural characterizations of Barnette graphs. Noting that Spider web graphs are a subclass of Annular Decomposable Barnette (ADB graphs) graphs and are Hamiltonian, we study ADB graphs and their annular-connected subclass (ADB-AC graphs). We…
We study the flow extension of graphs, i.e., pre-assigning a partial flow on the edges incident to a given vertex and aiming to extend to the entire graph. This is closely related to Tutte's $3$-flow conjecture(1972) that every $4$-edge-connected graph admits a nowhere-zero $3$-flow and a $\mathbb{Z}_3$-group connectivity conjecture(3GCC) of Jaeger, Linial, Payan, and Tarsi(1992) that every $5$-edge-connected graph $G$ is $\mathbb{Z}_3$-connected. Our main results show that these conjectures are equivalent to their natural flow extension versions and present some applications. The $3$-flow cas…
We discuss the problem of embedding graphs in the plane with restrictions on the vertex mapping. In particular, we introduce a technique for drawing planar graphs with a fixed vertex mapping that bounds the number of times edges bend. An immediate consequence of this technique is that any planar graph can be drawn with a fixed vertex mapping so that edges map to piecewise linear curves with at most $3n + O(1)$ bends each. By considering uniformly random planar graphs, we show that $2n + O(1)$ bends per edge is sufficient on average. To further utilize our technique, we consider simultaneous em…
For a class $\mathcal{D}$ of drawings of loopless (multi-)graphs in the plane, a drawing $D \in \mathcal{D}$ is \emph{saturated} when the addition of any edge to $D$ results in $D' \notin \mathcal{D}$ - this is analogous to saturated graphs in a graph class as introduced by Turán (1941) and Erdős, Hajnal, and Moon (1964). We focus on $k$-planar drawings, that is, graphs drawn in the plane where each edge is crossed at most $k$ times, and the classes $\mathcal{D}$ of all $k$-planar drawings obeying a number of restrictions, such as having no crossing incident edges, no pair of edges crossing mo…
We introduce and study the problem \mpd, which asks for two planar graphs $G_1$ and $G_2$ whether $G_1$ can be embedded such that its dual is isomorphic to $G_2$. Our algorithmic main result is an NP-completeness proof for the general case and a linear-time algorithm for biconnected graphs. To shed light onto the combinatorial structure of the duals of a planar graph, we consider the \emph{common dual relation} $\sim$, where $G_1 \sim G_2$ if and only if they have a common dual. While $\sim$ is generally not transitive, we show that the restriction to biconnected graphs is an equivalence relat…
We study homomorphism problems of signed graphs. A signed graph is an undirected graph where each edge is given a sign, positive or negative. An important concept for signed graphs is the operation of switching at a vertex, which is to change the sign of each incident edge. A homomorphism of a graph is a vertex-mapping that preserves the adjacencies; in the case of signed graphs, we also preserve the edge-signs. Special homomorphisms of signed graphs, called s-homomorphisms, have been studied. In an s-homomorphism, we allow, before the mapping, to perform any number of switchings on the source…
We study the dimer model for a planar bipartite graph N embedded in a disk, with boundary vertices on the boundary of the disk. Counting dimer configurations with specified boundary conditions gives a point in the totally nonnegative Grassmannian. Considering pairing probabilities for the double-dimer model gives rise to Grassmann analogues of Rhoades and Skandera's Temperley-Lieb immanants. The same problem for the (probably novel) triple-dimer model gives rise to the combinatorics of Kuperberg's webs and Grassmann analogues of Pylyavskyy's web immanants. This draws a connection between the s…
We consider the monomer-dimer partition function on arbitrary finite planar graphs and arbitrary monomer and dimer weights, with the restriction that the only non-zero monomer weights are those on the boundary. We prove a Pfaffian formula for the corresponding partition function. As a consequence of this result, multipoint boundary monomer correlation functions at close packing are shown to satisfy fermionic statistics. Our proof is based on the celebrated Kasteleyn theorem, combined with a theorem on Pfaffians proved by one of the authors, and a careful labeling and directing procedure of the…
