Sharp bounds on the least eigenvalue of an arbitrary graph are presented. Necessary and sufficient (just sufficient) conditions for the lower (upper) bound to be attained are deduced using edge clique partitions. As an application, we prove that the least eigenvalue of the $n$-Queens' graph $\mathcal{Q}(n)$ is equal to $-4$ for every $n \ge 4$ and it is also proven that the multiplicity of this eigenvalue is $(n-3)^2$. Additionally, some results on the edge clique partition graph parameters are obtained.
A graph $G$ of order $nv$ where $n\geq 2$ and $v\geq 2$ is said to be weakly $(n,v)$-clique-partitioned if its vertex set can be decomposed in a unique way into $n$ vertex-disjoint $v$-cliques. It is strongly $(n,v)$-clique-partitioned if in addition, the only $v$-cliques of $G$ are the $n$ cliques in the decomposition. We determine the structure of such graphs which have the largest possible number of edges.
We give lower bounds on the size and total size of clique partitions of a graph in terms of its spectral radius and minimum degree, and derive a spectral upper bound for the maximum number of edge-disjoint $t$-cliques. The extremal graphs attaining the bounds are exactly the block graphs of Steiner $2$-designs and the regular graphs with $K_t$-decompositions, respectively.
This work examines the problem of clique enumeration on a graph by exploiting its clique covers. The principle of inclusion/exclusion is applied to determine the number of cliques of size $r$ in the graph union of a set $\mathcal{C} = \{c_1, \ldots, c_m\}$ of $m$ cliques. This leads to a deeper examination of the sets involved and to an orbit partition, $Γ$, of the power set $\mathcal{P}(\mathcal{N}_{m})$ of $\mathcal{N}_{m} = \{1, \ldots, m\}$. Applied to the cliques, this partition gives insight into clique enumeration and yields new results on cliques within a clique cover, including expres…
A multifamily set representation of a finite simple graph $G$ is a multifamily $\mathcal{F}$ of sets (not necessarily distinct) for which each set represents a vertex in $G$ and two sets in $\mathcal{F}$ intersects if and only if the two corresponding vertices are adjacent. For a graph $G$, an \textit{edge clique covering} (\textit{edge clique partition}, respectively) $\mathcal{Q}$ is a set of cliques for which every edge is contained in \textit{at least} (\textit{exactly}, respectively) one member of $\mathcal{Q}$. In 1966, P. Erdös, A. Goodman, and L. Pósa (The representation of a graph by …
The sigma clique cover number (resp. sigma clique partition number) of graph G, denoted by scc(G) (resp. scp(G)), is defined as the smallest integer k for which there exists a collection of cliques of G, covering (resp. partitioning) all edges of G such that the sum of sizes of the cliques is at most k. In this paper, among some results we provide some tight bounds for scc and scp.
In this paper, we present a sharp upper and lower bounds for the signless Laplacian spectral radius of graphs in terms of clique number. Moreover, the extremal graphs which attain the upper and lower bounds are characterized. In addition, these results disprove the two conjectures on the signless Laplacian spectral radius in [P. Hansen and C. Lucas, Bounds and conjectures for the signless Laplacian index of graphs, Linear Algebra Appl., 432(2010) 3319-3336].
A strong clique in a graph is a clique intersecting all inclusion-maximal stable sets. Strong cliques play an important role in the study of perfect graphs. We study strong cliques in the class of diamond-free graphs, from both structural and algorithmic points of view. We show that the following five NP-hard or co-NP-hard problems remain intractable when restricted to the class of diamond-free graphs: Is a given clique strong? Does the graph have a strong clique? Is every vertex contained in a strong clique? Given a partition of the vertex set into cliques, is every clique in the partition st…
For a graph $G$, let $cp(G)$ denote the minimum number of cliques of $G$ needed to cover the edges of $G$ exactly once. Similarly, let $bp_k(G)$ denote the minimum number of bicliques (i.e. complete bipartite subgraphs of $G$) needed to cover each edge of $G$ exactly $k$ times. We consider two conjectures -- one regarding the maximum possible value of $cp(G) + cp(\overline{G})$ (due to de Caen, Erdős, Pullman and Wormald) and the other regarding $bp_k(K_n)$ (due to de Caen, Gregory and Pritikin). We disprove the first, obtaining improved lower and upper bounds on $\max_G cp(G) + cp(\overline{G…
In this paper, we are interested in minimizing the sum of block sizes in a pairwise balanced design, where there are some constraints on the size of one block or the size of the largest block. For every positive integers n;m, where m ? n, let S(n;m) be the smallest integer s for which there exists a PBD on n points whose largest block has size m and the sum of its block sizes is equal to s. Also, let S0(n;m) be the smallest integers for which there exists a PBD on n points which has a block of size m and the sum of it block sizes is equal to s. We prove some lower bounds for S(n;m) and S0(n;m)…
Motivated by the problem of Gallai on $(1-1)$-transversals of $2$-intervals, it was proved by the authors in 1969 that if the edges of a complete graph $K$ are colored with red and blue (both colors can appear on an edge) so that there is no monochromatic induced $C_4$ and $C_5$ then the vertices of $K$ can be partitioned into a red and a blue clique. Aharoni, Berger, Chudnovsky and Ziani recently strengthened this by showing that it is enough to assume that there is no induced monochromatic $C_4$ and there is no induced $C_5$ in {\em one of the colors}. Here this is strengthened further, it i…
In 1994 S. McGuinness showed that any greedy clique decompo- sition of an n-vertex graph has at most $\lfloor n^2/4 \rfloor$ cliques (The greedy clique decomposition of a graph, J. Graph Theory 18 (1994) 427-430), where a clique decomposition means a clique partition of the edge set and a greedy clique decomposition of a graph is obtained by removing maximal cliques from a graph one by one until the graph is empty. This result solved a conjecture by P. Winkler. A multifamily set rep- resentation of a simple graph G is a family of sets, not necessarily distinct, each member of which represents …
A Sharp Ramsey Theorem for Admissible Colorings of Ordered Cliques
School of Science, Shanghai Institute of Technology（上海应用技术大学理学院）；School of Science, Shenyang Aerospace University（沈阳航空航天大学理学院）；School of Mathematical Sciences, Shenzhen University（深圳大学数学科学学院）
Motivated by Chudnovsky's structure theorem of bull-free graphs, Abu-Khzam, Feghali, and Müller have recently proved that deciding if a graph has a vertex partition into disjoint cliques and a triangle-free graph is NP-complete for five graph classes. The problem is trivial for the intersection of these five classes. We prove that the problem is NP-complete for the intersection of two subsets of size four among the five classes. We also show NP-completeness for other small classes, such as graphs with maximum degree 4 and line graphs.
A graph $G$ is {\em well-covered} if every maximal independent set has the same cardinality $q$. Let $i_k(G)$ denote the number of independent sets of cardinality $k$ in $G$. Brown, Dilcher, and Nowakowski conjectured that the independence sequence $(i_0(G), i_1(G), \ldots, i_q(G))$ was unimodal for any well-ordered graph $G$ with independence number $q$. Michael and Traves disproved this conjecture. Instead they posited the so-called ``Roller Coaster" Conjecture: that the terms \[ i_{\left\lceil\frac{q}2\right\rceil}(G), i_{\left\lceil\frac{q}2\right\rceil+1}(G), \ldots, i_q(G) \] could be in…
A graph $G = (V, E)$ is \emph{partitionable} if there exists a partition $\{A, B\}$ of $V$ such that $A$ induces a disjoint union of cliques and $B$ induces a triangle-free graph. In this paper we investigate the computational complexity of deciding whether a graph is partitionable. The problem is known to be $\NP$-complete on arbitrary graphs. Here it is proved that if a graph $G$ is bull-free, planar, perfect, $K_4$-free or does not contain certain holes then deciding whether $G$ is partitionable is $\NP$-complete. This answers an open question posed by Thomass{é}, Trotignon and Vuškovi{ć}. …
As a strengthening of Hadwiger's conjecture, Gerards and Seymour conjectured that every graph with no odd $K_t$ minor is $(t-1)$-colorable. We prove two weaker variants of this conjecture. Firstly, we show that for each $t \geq 2$, every graph with no odd $K_t$ minor has a partition of its vertex set into $6t-9$ sets $V_1, \dots, V_{6t-9}$ such that each $V_i$ induces a subgraph of bounded maximum degree. Secondly, we prove that for each $t \geq 2$, every graph with no odd $K_t$ minor has a partition of its vertex set into $10t-13$ sets $V_1, \dots, V_{10t-13}$ such that each $V_i$ induces a s…
Fix integers $n \ge r \ge 2$. A clique partition of ${[n] \choose r}$ is a collection of proper subsets $A_1, A_2, ..., A_t \subset [n]$ such that $\bigcup_i{A_i \choose r}$ is a partition of ${[n] \choose r}$. Clique partitions are related to design theory, coding theory, projective geometry, and extremal combinatorics. Let $\cp(n,r)$ denote the minimum size of a clique partition of ${[n] \choose r}$. A classical theorem of de Bruijn and Erd\H os states that $\cp(n, 2) = n$ and also determines the extremal configurations. In this paper we study $\cp(n,r)$, and show in general that for each fi…
Linear extensions and directed clique counts via modular partitions
Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics（马克斯·普朗克分子细胞生物学与遗传学研究所）；Center for Systems Biology（系统生物学中心）；SISSA（的里雅斯特高等研究学院）；Nottingham Trent University（诺丁汉特伦特大学）
Motivated by an approach to visualization of high dimensional statistical data given in Hurley and Oldford (2011), this work examines the clique structure of $J_n(m, m-1)$ Johnson graphs. Cliques and maximal cliques are characterized and proved to be of one of only two types. These types are characterized by features of the intersection and of the union of the subsets of [n] = {1, 2, ..., n} which define the vertices of the graph. Clique numbers and clique partition numbers follow. The results on Johnson graphs are connected to results on intersecting families of sets related to extremal set t…
Inspired by a question of Yannakakis on the Vertex Packing polytope of perfect graphs, we study the Clique-Stable Set Separation in a non-hereditary subclass of perfect graphs. A cut (B,W) of G (a bipartition of V(G)) separates a clique K and a stable set S if $K\subseteq B$ and $S\subseteq W$. A Clique-Stable Set Separator is a family of cuts such that for every clique K, and for every stable set S disjoint from K, there exists a cut in the family that separates K and S. Given a class of graphs, the question is to know whether every graph of the class admits a Clique-Stable Set Separator cont…
For given integers k, l we ask whether every large graph with a sufficiently small number of k-cliques and k-anticliques must contain an induced copy of every l-vertex graph. Here we prove this claim for k=l=3 with a sharp bound. A similar phenomenon is established as well for tournaments with k=l=4.
A graph is said to be well-covered if all its maximal independent sets are of the same size. In 1999, Yamashita and Kameda introduced a subclass of well-covered graphs, called localizable graphs and defined as graphs having a partition of the vertex set into strong cliques, where a clique in a graph is strong if it intersects all maximal independent sets. Yamashita and Kameda observed that all well-covered trees are localizable, pointed out that the converse inclusion fails in general, and asked for a characterization of localizable graphs. In this paper we obtain several structural and algori…
In this work, we give the sharp upper bound for the number of cliques in graphs with bounded odd circumferences. This generalized Turán-type result is an extension of the celebrated Erdős and Gallai theorem and a strengthening of Luo's recent result. The same bound for graphs with bounded even circumferences is a trivial application of the theorem of Li and Ning.
We provide an algorithm that verifies the optimal colored Tverberg problem for $10$ points in the plane: Every $10$ points in the plane in color classes of size at most $3$ can be partitioned in $4$ rainbow pieces such that their convex hulls intersect in a common point. This is achieved by translating the problem to $k$-partite graphs and using a new algorithm to verify that those graphs do not have a $k$-clique.
School of Mathematics, Shandong University（山东大学数学学院）；Extremal Combinatorics and Probability Group (ECOPRO), Institute for Basic Science (IBS)（基础科学研究所极端组合与概率组）；Center for Discrete Mathematics, Fuzhou University（福州大学离散数学中心）
Vertex colouring is a well-known problem in combinatorial optimisation, whose alternative integer programming formulations have recently attracted considerable attention. This paper briefly surveys seven known formulations of vertex colouring and introduces a formulation of vertex colouring using a suitable clique partition of the graph. This formulation is applicable in timetabling applications, where such a clique partition of the conflict graph is given implicitly. In contrast with some alternatives, the presented formulation can also be easily extended to accommodate complex performance in…
Many NP-hard problems, such as Dominating Set, are FPT parameterized by clique-width. For graphs of clique-width $k$ given with a $k$-expression, Dominating Set can be solved in $4^k n^{O(1)}$ time. However, no FPT algorithm is known for computing an optimal $k$-expression. For a graph of clique-width $k$, if we rely on known algorithms to compute a $(2^{3k}-1)$-expression via rank-width and then solving Dominating Set using the $(2^{3k}-1)$-expression, the above algorithm will only give a runtime of $4^{2^{3k}} n^{O(1)}$. There have been results which overcome this exponential jump; the best …
A clique (resp., independent set) in a graph is strong if it intersects every maximal independent sets (resp., every maximal cliques). A graph is CIS if all of its maximal cliques are strong and localizable if it admits a partition of its vertex set into strong cliques. In this paper we prove that a clique $C$ in a vertex-transitive graph $Γ$ is strong if and only if $|C||I|=|V(Γ)|$ for every maximal independent set $I$ of $Γ$. Based on this result we prove that a vertex-transitive graph is CIS if and only if it admits a strong clique and a strong independent set. We classify all vertex-transi…
A {\it krausz $(k,m)$-partition} of a graph $G$ is the partition of $G$ into cliques, such that any vertex belongs to at most $k$ cliques and any two cliques have at most $m$ vertices in common. The {\it $m$-krausz} dimension $kdim_m(G)$ of the graph $G$ is the minimum number $k$ such that $G$ has a krausz $(k,m)$-partition. 1-krausz dimension is known and studied krausz dimension of graph $kdim(G)$. In this paper we prove, that the problem $"kdim(G)\leq 3"$ is polynomially solvable for chordal graphs, thus partially solving the problem of P. Hlineny and J. Kratochvil. We show, that the proble…
For a graph $X$ without isolated vertices and without isolated edges, a product-irregular labelling $ω:E(X)\rightarrow \{1,2,\ldots,s\}$, first defined by Anholcer in 2009, is a labelling of the edges of $X$ such that for any two distinct vertices $u$ and $v$ of $X$ the product of labels of the edges incident with $u$ is different from the product of labels of the edges incident with $v$. The minimal $s$ for which there exist a product irregular labeling is called the product irregularity strength of $X$ and is denoted by $ps(X)$. Clique cover number of a graph is the minimum number of cliques…
We show that for each $r\ge 4$, in a density range extending up to, and slightly beyond, the threshold for a $K_r$-factor, the copies of $K_r$ in the random graph $G(n,p)$ are randomly distributed, in the (one-sided) sense that the hypergraph that they form contains a copy of a binomial random hypergraph with almost exactly the right density. Thus Jeff Kahn's recent asymptotically sharp bound for the threshold in Shamir's hypergraph matching problem implies a corresponding bound for the threshold for $G(n,p)$ to contain a $K_r$-factor. The case $r=3$ is more difficult, and has been settled by …
In this note, we show that a complete $k$-partite graph is the only graph with clique number $k$ among all degree-equivalent simple graphs. This result gives a lower bound on the clique number, which is sharper than existing bounds on a large family of graphs.
We show that for any integer $t\geq 2$, every properly edge-coloured graph on $n$ vertices with more than $n^{1+o(1)}$ edges contains a rainbow subdivision of $K_t$. Note that this bound on the number of edges is sharp up to the $o(1)$ error term. This is a rainbow analogue of some classical results on clique subdivisions and extends some results on rainbow Turán numbers. Our method relies on the framework introduced by Sudakov and Tomon[2020] which we adapt to find robust expanders in the coloured setting.
In 1987, Kolaitis, Prömel and Rothschild proved that, for every fixed $r \in \mathbb{N}$, almost every $n$-vertex $K_{r+1}$-free graph is $r$-partite. In this paper we extend this result to all functions $r = r(n)$ with $r \leqslant (\log n)^{1/4}$. The proof combines a new (close to sharp) supersaturation version of the Erdős-Simonovits stability theorem, the hypergraph container method, and a counting technique developed by Balogh, Bollobás and Simonovits.
A graph is perfect if the chromatic number of every induced subgraph equals the size of its largest clique, and an algorithm of Grötschel, Lovász, and Schrijver from 1988 finds an optimal colouring of a perfect graph in polynomial time. But this algorithm uses the ellipsoid method, and it is a well-known open question to construct a "combinatorial" polynomial-time algorithm that yields an optimal colouring of a perfect graph. A skew partition in $G$ is a partition $(A,B)$ of $V(G)$ such that $G[A]$ is not connected and $\bar{G}[B]$ is not connected, where $\bar{G}$ denotes the complement graph…
How many cliques can a graph on $n$ vertices have with a forbidden substructure? Extremal problems of this sort have been studied for a long time. This paper studies the maximum possible number of cliques in a graph on $n$ vertices with a forbidden clique subdivision or immersion. We prove for $t$ sufficiently large that every graph on $n \geq t$ vertices with no $K_t$-immersion has at most $2^{t+\log^2 t}n$ cliques, which is sharp apart from the $2^{O(\log^2 t)}$ factor. We also prove that the maximum number of cliques in an $n$-vertex graph with no $K_t$-subdivision is at most $2^{1.817t}n$.…
In this paper we consider $r$-regular graphs $G$ that admit the vertex set partition such that one of the induced subgraphs is the join of an $s$-vertex clique and a $t$-vertex co-clique and represents a star complement for an eigenvalue $μ$ of $G$. The cases in which one of the parameters $s, t$ is less than 2 or $μ=r$ are already resolved. It is conjectured in [J. Wang, X. Yuan, L. Liu, Regular graphs with a prescribed complete multipartite graph as a star complement, Linear Algebra Appl.~579 (2019) 302--319] that if $s, t\geq 2$ and $μ\neq r$, then $μ=-2, t=2$ and $G=\overline{(s+1)K_2}$. F…
The biclique partition number $(\text{bp})$ of a graph $G$ is referred to as the least number of complete bipartite (biclique) subgraphs that are required to cover the edges of the graph exactly once. In this paper, we show that the biclique partition number ($\text{bp}$) of a co-chordal (complementary graph of chordal) graph $G = (V, E)$ is less than the number of maximal cliques ($\text{mc}$) of its complementary graph: a chordal graph $G^c = (V, E^c)$. We first provide a general framework of the ``divide and conquer" heuristic of finding minimum biclique partitions of co-chordal graphs base…
Given a graph $G$ and an integer $\ell\ge 2$, we denote by $α_{\ell}(G)$ the maximum size of a $K_{\ell}$-free subset of vertices in $V(G)$. A recent question of Nenadov and Pehova asks for determining the best possible minimum degree conditions forcing clique-factors in $n$-vertex graphs $G$ with $α_{\ell}(G) = o(n)$, which can be seen as a Ramsey--Turán variant of the celebrated Hajnal--Szemerédi theorem. In this paper we find the asymptotical sharp minimum degree threshold for $K_r$-factors in $n$-vertex graphs $G$ with $α_\ell(G)=n^{1-o(1)}$ for all $r\ge \ell\ge 2$.
In this paper we obtain some upper bounds for $b$-chromatic number of $K_{1,t}$ -free graphs, graphs with given minimum clique partition and bipartite graphs. These bounds are in terms of either clique number or chromatic number of graphs or biclique number for bipartite graphs. We show that all the bounds are tight.
