We investigate lower bounds on the average degree in r-cliques in graphs of order n and size greater than t(r,n), where t(r,n) is the size of the Turan graph on n vertices and r color classes. Continuing earlier research of Edwards and Faudree, we completely prove a conjecture of Bollobas and Erdoes from 1975.
For a clique cover $C$ in the undirected graph $G$, the clique cover graph of $C$ is the graph obtained by contracting the vertices of each clique in $C$ into a single vertex. The clique cover width of G, denoted by $CCW(G)$, is the minimum value of the bandwidth of all clique cover graphs of $G$. When $G$ is the clique sum of $G_1$ and $G_2$, we prove that $CCW(G) \le 3/2(CCW(G_1) + CCW(G_2))$.
Let $k_r(n,δ)$ be the minimum number of $r$-cliques in graphs with $n$ vertices and minimum degree $δ$. We evaluate $k_r(n,δ)$ for $δ\leq 4n/5$ and some other cases. Moreover, we give a construction, which we conjecture to give all extremal graphs (subject to certain conditions on $n$, $δ$ and $r$).
Generalized Turán problems have been a central topic of study in extremal combinatorics throughout the last few decades. One such problem, maximizing the number of cliques of a fixed order in a graph with fixed number of vertices and bounded maximum degree, was recently completely resolved by Chase. Kirsch and Radcliffe raised a natural variant of this problem where the number of edges is fixed instead of the number of vertices. In this paper, we determine the maximum number of cliques of a fixed order in a graph with fixed number of edges and bounded maximum degree, resolving a conjecture by …
To any simple graph $G$, the clique graph operator $K$ associates the graph $K(G)$ which is the intersection graph of the maximal complete subgraphs of $G$. The iterated clique graphs are defined by $K^{0}(G)=G$ and $K^{n}(G)=K(K^{n-1}(G))$ for $n\geq 1$. If there are $m<n$ such that $K^{m}(G)$ is isomorphic to $K^{n}(G)$ we say that $G$ is convergent, otherwise, $G$ is divergent. The first example of a divergent graph was shown by Neumann-Lara in the 1970s, and is the graph of the octahedron. In this paper, we prove that among the connected graphs with maximum degree 4, the octahedron is the …
A graph $G$ is called $C_4$-free if it does not contain the cycle $C_4$ as an induced subgraph. Hubenko, Solymosi and the first author proved (answering a question of Erd\H os) a peculiar property of $C_4$-free graphs: $C_4$ graphs with $n$ vertices and average degree at least $cn$ contain a complete subgraph (clique) of size at least $c'n$ (with $c'= 0.1c^2n$). We prove here better bounds (${c^2n\over 2+c}$ in general and $(c-1/3)n$ when $ c \le 0.733$) from the stronger assumption that the $C_4$-free graphs have minimum degree at least $cn$. Our main result is a theorem for regular graphs, c…
We prove that $s_r(K_k) = O(k^5 r^{5/2})$, where $s_r(K_k)$ is the Ramsey parameter introduced by Burr, Erdős and Lovász in 1976, which is defined as the smallest minimum degree of a graph $G$ such that any $r$-colouring of the edges of $G$ contains a monochromatic $K_k$, whereas no proper subgraph of $G$ has this property. The construction used in our proof relies on a group theoretic model of generalised quadrangles introduced by Kantor in 1980.
Mader conjectured that every $C_4$-free graph has a subdivision of a clique of order linear in its average degree. We show that every $C_6$-free graph has such a subdivision of a large clique. We also prove the dense case of Mader's conjecture in a stronger sense, i.e. for every $c$, there is a $c'$ such that every $C_4$-free graph with average degree $cn^{1/2}$ has a subdivision of a clique $K_\ell$ with $\ell=\lfloor c'n^{1/2}\rfloor$ where every edge is subdivided exactly $3$ times.
In 1985, Erdős and Nešetřil conjectured that the square of the line graph of a graph $G$, that is $L(G)^2$, can be colored with $\frac{5}{4}Δ(G)^2$ colors. This conjecture implies the weaker conjecture that the clique number of such a graph, that is $ω(L(G)^2)$, is at most $\frac{5}{4}Δ(G)^2$. In 2015, Śleszyńska-Nowak proved that $ω(L(G)^2)\le \frac{3}{2}Δ(G)^2$. In this paper, we prove that $ω(L(G)^2)\le \frac{4}{3}Δ(G)^2$. This theorem follows from our stronger result that $ω(L(G)^2)\le \frac{σ(G)^2}{3}$ where $σ(G) := \max_{uv\in E(G)} d(u) + d(v)$, is the Ore-degree of the graph $G$.
The realization graph $\mathcal{G}(d)$ of a degree sequence $d$ is the graph whose vertices are labeled realizations of $d$, where edges join realizations that differ by swapping a single pair of edges. Barrus [On realization graphs of degree sequences, Discrete Mathematics, vol. 339 (2016), no. 8, pp. 2146-2152] characterized $d$ for which $\mathcal{G}(d)$ is triangle-free. Here, for any $n \geq 4$, we describe a structure in realizations of $d$ that exactly determines whether $G(d)$ has a clique of size $n$. As a consequence we determine the degree sequences $d$ for which $\mathcal{G}(d)$ is…
Recently Cutler and Radcliffe proved that the graph on $n$ vertices with maximum degree at most $r$ having the most cliques is a disjoint union of $\lfloor n/(r+1)\rfloor$ cliques of size $r+1$ together with a clique on the remainder of the vertices. It is very natural also to consider this question when the limiting resource is edges rather than vertices. In this paper we prove that among graphs with $m$ edges and maximum degree at most $r$, the graph that has the most cliques of size at least two is the disjoint union of $\bigl\lfloor m \bigm/\binom{r+1}{2} \bigr\rfloor$ cliques of size $r+1…
In 1984, Thomassen conjectured that for every constant $k \in \mathbb{N}$, there exists $d$ such that every graph with average degree at least $d$ contains a balanced subdivision of a complete graph on $k$ vertices, i.e. a subdivision in which each edge is subdivided the same number of times. Recently, Liu and Montgomery confirmed Thomassen's conjecture. We show that for every constant $0<c<1/2$, every graph with average degree at least $d$ contains a balanced subdivision of a complete graph of size at least $Ω(d^{c})$. Note that this bound is almost optimal. Moreover, we show that every spars…
Our main result essentially reduces the problem of finding an edge-decomposition of a balanced r-partite graph of large minimum degree into r-cliques to the problem of finding a fractional r-clique decomposition or an approximate one. Together with very recent results of Bowditch and Dukes as well as Montgomery on fractional decompositions into triangles and cliques respectively, this gives the best known bounds on the minimum degree which ensures an edge-decomposition of an r-partite graph into r-cliques (subject to trivially necessary divisibility conditions). The case of triangles translate…
A graph $G$ is said to be $q$-Ramsey for a $q$-tuple of graphs $(H_1,\ldots,H_q)$, denoted by $G\to_q(H_1,\ldots,H_q)$, if every $q$-edge-coloring of $G$ contains a monochromatic copy of $H_i$ in color $i,$ for some $i\in[q]$. Let $s_q(H_1,\ldots,H_q)$ denote the smallest minimum degree of $G$ over all graphs $G$ that are minimal $q$-Ramsey for $(H_1,\ldots,H_q)$ (with respect to subgraph inclusion). The study of this parameter was initiated in 1976 by Burr, Erdős and Lovász, who determined its value precisely for a pair of cliques. Over the past two decades the parameter $s_q$ has been studie…
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.
To any simple graph \(G\), the clique graph operator \(K\) assigns the graph \(K(G)\) which is the intersection graph of the maximal complete subgraphs of \(G\). The iterated clique graphs are defined by \(K^{0}(G)=G\) and \(K^{n}(G)=K(K^{n-1}(G))\) for \(n\geq 1\). We associate topological concepts to graphs by means of the simplicial complex \(\mathrm{Cl}(G)\) of complete subgraphs of \(G\). Hence we say that the graphs \(G_{1}\) and \(G_{2}\) are homotopic whenever \(\mathrm{Cl}(G_{1})\) and \(\mathrm{Cl}(G_{2})\) are. A graph \(G\) such that \(K^{n}(G)\simeq G\) for all \(n\geq1\) is calle…
We study structural properties of graphs with fixed clique number and high minimum degree. In particular, we show that there exists a function $L=L(r,\varepsilon)$, such that every $K_r$-free graph $G$ on $n$ vertices with minimum degree at least $(\frac{2r-5}{2r-3}+\varepsilon)n$ is homomorphic to a $K_r$-free graph on at most $L$ vertices. It is known that the required minimum degree condition is approximately best possible for this result. For $r=3$ this result was obtained by Łuczak [On the structure of triangle-free graphs of large minimum degree, Combinatorica 26 (2006), no. 4, 489-493] …
Let $GP(q,d)$ be the $d$-Paley graph defined on the finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$. It is notoriously difficult to improve the trivial upper bound $\sqrt{q}$ on the clique number of $GP(q,d)$. In this paper, we investigate the connection between Gauss sums over a finite field and the maximum cliques of their corresponding generalized Paley graphs. We show that the trivial upper bound on the clique number of $GP(q,d)$ is tight if and only if $d \mid (\sqrt{q}+1)$, which strengthens the previous related results by Broere-Döman-Ridley and Schneider-Silva. We also obtain a new simple proof of Stickel…
Given any integers $s,t\geq 2$, we show there exists some $c=c(s,t)>0$ such that any $K_{s,t}$-free graph with average degree $d$ contains a subdivision of a clique with at least $cd^{\frac{1}{2}\frac{s}{s-1}}$ vertices. In particular, when $s=2$ this resolves in a strong sense the conjecture of Mader in 1999 that every $C_4$-free graph has a subdivision of a clique with order linear in the average degree of the original graph. In general, the widely conjectured asymptotic behaviour of the extremal density of $K_{s,t}$-free graphs suggests our result is tight up to the constant $c(s,t)$.
Given a graphic degree sequence $D$, let $χ(D)$ (respectively $ω(D)$, $h(D)$, and $H(D)$) denote the maximum value of the chromatic number (respectively, the size of the largest clique, largest clique subdivision, and largest clique minor) taken over all simple graphs whose degree sequence is $D$. It is proved that $χ(D)\le h(D)$. Moreover, it is shown that a subdivision of a clique of order $χ(D)$ exists where each edge is subdivided at most once and the set of all subdivided edges forms a collection of disjoint stars. This bound is an analogue of the Hajos Conjecture for degree sequences and…
All the work made so far on edge-covering a graph by cliques focus on finding the minimum number of cliques that cover the graph. On this paper, we fix the number of cliques that cover a graph by the same number of vertices that the graph has, and give an upper bound for the sum of the number of vertices of these cliques in the cases where this covering is possible.
Zykov showed in 1949 that among graphs on $n$ vertices with clique number $ω(G) \le ω$, the Turán graph $T_ω(n)$ maximizes not only the number of edges but also the number of copies of $K_t$ for each size $t$. The problem of maximizing the number of copies of $K_t$ has also been studied within other classes of graphs, such as those on $n$ vertices with maximum degree $Δ(G) \le Δ$. We combine these restrictions and investigate which graphs with $Δ(G) \le Δ$ and $ω(G) \le ω$ maximize the number of copies of $K_t$ per vertex. We define $f_t(Δ,ω)$ as the supremum of $ρ_t$, the number of copies of …
The greedy coloring algorithm shows that a graph of maximum degree at most $Δ$ has chromatic number at most $Δ+ 1$, and this is tight for cliques. Much attention has been devoted to improving this "greedy bound" for graphs without large cliques. Brooks famously proved that this bound can be improved by one if $Δ\geq 3$ and the graph contains no clique of size $Δ+ 1$. Reed's Conjecture states that the "greedy bound" can be improved by $k$ if the graph contains no clique of size $Δ+ 1 - 2k$. Johansson proved that the "greedy bound" can be improved by a factor of $Ω(\ln(Δ)^{-1})$ or $Ω\left(\frac…
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.
Given a graph $H$, a balanced subdivision of $H$ is a graph obtained from $H$ by subdividing every edge the same number of times. In 1984, Thomassen conjectured that for each integer $k\ge 1$, high average degree is sufficient to guarantee a balanced subdivision of $K_k$. Recently, Liu and Montgomery resolved this conjecture. We give an optimal estimate up to an absolute constant factor by showing that there exists $c>0$ such that for sufficiently large $d$, every graph with average degree at least $d$ contains a balanced subdivision of a clique with at least $cd^{1/2}$ vertices. It also confi…
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 $r\ge \ell\ge 2$.
A clique covering of a graph $G$ is a set of cliques of $G$ such that any edge of $G$ is contained in one of these cliques, and the weight of a clique covering is the sum of the sizes of the cliques in it. The sigma clique cover number $scc(G)$ of a graph $G$, is defined as the smallest possible weight of a clique covering of $G$. Let $ K_t(d) $ denote the complete $ t $-partite graph with each part of size $d$. We prove that for any fixed $d \ge 2$, we have $$\lim_{t \rightarrow \infty} scc(K_t(d))= \frac{d}{2} t\log t.$$ This disproves a conjecture of Davoodi, Javadi and Omoomi.
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)…
We give a minimum degree condition sufficent to ensure the existence of a fractional $K_r$-decomposition in a balanced $r$-partite graph (subject to some further simple necessary conditions). This generalises the non-partite problem studied recently by Barber, Lo, Kühn, Osthus and the author, and the $3$-partite fractional $K_3$-decomposition problem studied recently by Dukes. Combining our result with recent work by Barber, Kühn, Lo, Osthus and Taylor, this gives a minimum degree condition sufficient to ensure the existence of a (non-fractional) $K_r$-decomposition in a balanced $r$-partite g…
For each $r\ge 4$, we show that any graph $G$ with minimum degree at least $(1-1/100r)|G|$ has a fractional $K_r$-decomposition. This improves the best previous bounds on the minimum degree required to guarantee a fractional $K_r$-decomposition given by Dukes (for small $r$) and Barber, Kühn, Lo, Montgomery and Osthus (for large $r$), giving the first bound that is tight up to the constant multiple of $r$ (seen, for example, by considering Turán graphs). In combination with work by Glock, Kühn, Lo, Montgomery and Osthus, this shows that, for any graph $F$ with chromatic number $χ(F)\ge 4$, and…
We study the size of the shadow of $k$-uniform hypergraphs with bounded degree. Lower bounds on the ratio of the size of the shadow and the size of the hypergraph are given as a function of the degree bound and $k$. We show that cliques are extremal for a long range of degree bounds, but not for every bound. We give a general, but not sharp lower bound on the shadow ratio and show, that sometimes we can get extremal hypergraphs by deleting disjoint maximal matchings from a clique.
It is well known that $n/(n - μ)$, where $μ$ is the spectral radius of a graph with $n$ vertices, is a lower bound for the clique number. We conjecture that $μ$ can be replaced in this bound with $\sqrt{s^+}$, where $s^+$ is the sum of the squares of the positive eigenvalues. We prove this conjecture for various classes of graphs, including triangle-free graphs, and for almost all graphs.
We prove that $K_{χ(G)}$ is the only critical graph $G$ with $χ(G) \geq Δ(G) \geq 6$ and $ω(\mathcal{H}(G)) \leq \left \lfloor \frac{Δ(G)}{2} \right \rfloor - 2$. Here $\mathcal{H}(G)$ is the subgraph of $G$ induced on the vertices of degree at least $χ(G)$. Setting $ω(\mathcal{H}(G)) = 1$ proves a conjecture of Kierstead and Kostochka.
A complete subgraph of any simple graph $G$ on $k$ vertices is called a $k$-\emph{clique} of $G$. In this paper, we first introduce the concept of the value of a $k$-clique ($k>1$) as an extension of the idea of the degree of a given vertex. Then, we obtain the generalized version of handshaking lemma which we call it clique handshaking lemma. The well-known classical result of Mantel states that the maximum number of edges in the class of triangle-free graphs with $n$ vertices is equal to $\frac{n^{2}}{4}$. Our main goal here is to find an extension of the above result for the class of $K_{ω+…
A \emph{clique} is a set of pairwise adjacent vertices in a graph. We determine the maximum number of cliques in a graph for the following graph classes: (1) graphs with $n$ vertices and $m$ edges; (2) graphs with $n$ vertices, $m$ edges, and maximum degree $Δ$; (3) $d$-degenerate graphs with $n$ vertices and $m$ edges; (4) planar graphs with $n$ vertices and $m$ edges; and (5) graphs with $n$ vertices and no $K_5$-minor or no $K_{3,3}$-minor. For example, the maximum number of cliques in a planar graph with $n$ vertices is $8(n-2)$.
The distance energy of a simple connected graph $G$ is defined as the sum of absolute values of its distance eigenvalues. In this paper, we mainly give a positive answer to a conjecture of distance energy of clique trees proposed by Lin, Liu and Lu [H.~Q.~ Lin, R.~F.~Liu, X.~W.~Lu, The inertia and energy of the distance matrix of a connected graph, {\it Linear Algebra Appl.,} 467 (2015), 29-39.]
We prove that every triangle-free graph with maximum degree $Δ$ has list chromatic number at most $(1+o(1))\fracΔ{\ln Δ}$. This matches the best-known bound for graphs of girth at least 5. We also provide a new proof that for any $r\geq 4$ every $K_r$-free graph has list-chromatic number at most $200r\frac{Δ\ln\lnΔ}{\lnΔ}$.
Given a set A in Z/NZ we may form a Cayley sum graph G_A on vertex set Z/NZ by joining i to j if and only if i + j is in A. We investigate the extent to which performing this construction with a random set A simulates the generation of a random graph, proving that the clique number of G_A is a.s. O(log N). This shows that Cayley sum graphs can furnish good examples of Ramsey graphs. To prove this result we must study the specific structure of set addition on Z/NZ. Indeed, we also show that the clique number of a random Cayley sum graph on (Z/2Z)^n, 2^n = N, is almost surely not O(log N). Despi…
In this paper, we introduce the clique-blew up graph $CL(G)$ of a given graph $G$, which is obtained from $G$ by replacing each edge of $G$ with a complete graph $K_n$. We characterize all the normalized Laplacian spectrum of the grpah $CL(G)$ in term of the given graph $G$. Based on the spectrum obtained, the formulae to calculate the multiplicative degree-Kirchhoff index, the Kemeny's constant and the number of spanning trees of $CL(G)$ are derived well. Finally, the spectrum and indexes of the clique-blew up iterative graphs are present.
Building on recent work of Dvořák and Yepremyan, we show that every simple graph of minimum degree $7t+7$ contains $K_t$ as an immersion and that every graph with chromatic number at least $3.54t + 4$ contains $K_t$ as an immersion. We also show that every graph on $n$ vertices with no stable set of size three contains $K_{2\lfloor n/5 \rfloor}$ as an immersion.
We study the size of the largest clique $ω(G(n,α))$ in a random graph $G(n,α)$ on $n$ vertices which has power-law degree distribution with exponent $α$. We show that for `flat' degree sequences with $α>2$ whp the largest clique in $G(n,α)$ is of a constant size, while for the heavy tail distribution, when $0<α<2$, $ω(G(n,α))$ grows as a power of $n$. Moreover, we show that a natural simple algorithm whp finds in $G(n,α)$ a large clique of size $(1+o(1))ω(G(n,α))$ in polynomial time.
A k-clique covering of a simple graph G, is an edge covering of G by its cliques such that each vertex is contained in at most k cliques. The smallest k for which G admits a k-clique covering is called local clique cover number of G and is denoted by $lcc(G)$. Local clique cover number can be viewed as the local counterpart of the clique cover number which is equal to the minimum total number of cliques covering all edges. In this paper, several aspects of the problem are studied and its relationships to other well-known problems are discussed. Moreover, the local clique cover number of claw-f…
The clique removal lemma says that for every $r \geq 3$ and $\varepsilon>0$, there exists some $δ>0$ so that every $n$-vertex graph $G$ with fewer than $δn^r$ copies of $K_r$ can be made $K_r$-free by removing at most $\varepsilon n^2$ edges. The dependence of $δ$ on $\varepsilon$ in this result is notoriously difficult to determine: it is known that $δ^{-1}$ must be at least super-polynomial in $\varepsilon^{-1}$, and that it is at most of tower type in $\log \varepsilon^{-1}$. We prove that if one imposes an appropriate minimum degree condition on $G$, then one can actually take $δ$ to be a …
We consider the structure of $H$-free subgraphs of graphs with high minimal degree. We prove that for every $k>m$ there exists an $ε:=ε(k,m)>0$ so that the following holds. For every graph $H$ with chromatic number $k$ from which one can delete an edge and reduce the chromatic number, and for every graph $G$ on $n>n_0(H)$ vertices in which all degrees are at least $(1-ε)n$, any subgraph of $G$ which is $H$-free and contains the maximum number of copies of the complete graph $K_m$ is $(k-1)$-colorable. We also consider several extensions for the case of a general forbidden graph $H$ of a given …