Combinatorics (math.CO)

Abstract: This paper studies the relationship between the modified Foata$\unicode{x2013}$Strehl action (a.k.a. valley-hopping)$\unicode{x2014}$a group action on permutations used to demonstrate the $\gamma$-positivity of the Eulerian polynomials$\unicode{x2014}$and the number of rixed points $\operatorname{rix}$$\unicode{x2014}$a recursively-defined permutation statistic introduced by Lin in the context of an equidistribution problem. We give a linear-time iterative algorithm for computing the set of rixed points, and prove that the $\operatorname{rix}$ statistic is homomesic under valley-hopping. We also demonstrate that a bijection $\Phi$ introduced by Lin and Zeng in the study of the $\operatorname{rix}$ statistic sends orbits of the valley-hopping action to orbits of a cyclic version of valley-hopping, which implies that the number of fixed points $\operatorname{fix}$ is homomesic under cyclic valley-hopping.

Abstract: We give a compact variation of Seymour's proof that every $2$-edge-connected graph has a nowhere-zero $\mathbb{Z}_2 \times \mathbb{Z}_3$-flow.

Abstract: We prove that for every planar graph $X$ of treedepth $h$, there exists a positive integer $c$ such that for every $X$-minor-free graph $G$, there exists a graph $H$ of treewidth at most $f(h)$ such that $G$ is isomorphic to a subgraph of $H\boxtimes K_c$. This is a qualitative strengthening of the Grid-Minor Theorem of Robertson and Seymour (JCTB 1986), and treedepth is the optimal parameter in such a result. As an example application, we use this result to improve the upper bound for weak coloring numbers of graphs excluding a fixed graph as a minor.

Abstract: Dyck paths having height at most $h$ and without valleys at height $h-1$ are combinatorially interpreted by means of 312-avoding permutations with some restrictions on their \emph{left-to-right maxima}. The results are obtained by analyzing a restriction of a well-known bijection between the sets of Dyck paths and 312-avoding permutations. We also provide a recursive formula enumerating these two structures using ECO method and the theory of production matrices. As a further result we obtain a family of combinatorial identities involving Catalan numbers.

Abstract: Given the symmetric group $G = \operatorname{Sym}(n)$ and a multiplicity-free subgroup $H\leq G$, the orbitals of the action of $G$ on $G/H$ by left multiplication induce a commutative association scheme. The irreducible constituents of the permutation character of $G$ acting on $G/H$ are indexed by partitions of $n$ and if $\lambda \vdash n$ is the second largest partition in dominance ordering among these, then the Young subgroup $\operatorname{Sym}(\lambda)$ admits two orbits in its action on $G/H$, which are $\mathcal{S}_\lambda$ and its complement. In their monograph [Erd\H{o}s-Ko-Rado theorems: Algebraic Approaches. {\it Cambridge University Press}, 2016] (Problem~16.13.1), Godsil and Meagher asked whether $\mathcal{S}_\lambda$ is a coclique of a graph in the commutative association scheme arising from the action of $G$ on $G/H$. If such a graph exists, then they also asked whether its smallest eigenvalue is afforded by the $\lambda$-module. In this paper, we initiate the study of this question by taking $\lambda = [n-1,1]$. We show that the answer to this question is affirmative for the pair of groups $\left(G,H\right)$, where $G = \operatorname{Sym}(2k+1)$ and $H = \operatorname{Sym}(2) \wr \operatorname{Sym}(k)$, or $G = \operatorname{Sym}(n)$ and $H$ is one of $\operatorname{Alt}(k) \times \operatorname{Sym}(n-k),\ \operatorname{Alt}(k) \times \operatorname{Alt}(n-k)$, or $\left(\operatorname{Alt}(k)\times \operatorname{Alt}(n-k)\right) \cap \operatorname{Alt}(n)$. For the pair $(G,H) = \left(\operatorname{Sym}(2k),\operatorname{Sym}(k)\wr \operatorname{Sym}(2)\right)$, we also prove that the answer to this question of Godsil and Meagher is negative.

Abstract: Let $k\geq 3$. Given a $k$-uniform hypergraph $H$, the minimum codegree $\delta(H)$ is the largest $d\in\mathbb{N}$ such that every $(k-1)$-set of $V(H)$ is contained in at least $d$ edges. Given a $k$-uniform hypergraph $F$, the codegree Tur\'an density $\gamma(F)$ of $F$ is the smallest $\gamma \in [0,1]$ such that every $k$-uniform hypergraph on $n$ vertices with $\delta(H)\geq (\gamma + o(1))n$ contains a copy of $F$. Similarly as other variants of the hypergraph Tur\'an problem, determining the codegree Tur\'an density of a hypergraph is in general notoriously difficult and only few results are known. In this work, we show that for every $\varepsilon>0$, there is a $k$-uniform hypergraph $F$ with $0<\gamma(F)<\varepsilon$. This is in contrast to the classical Tur\'an density, which cannot take any value in the interval $(0,k!/k^k)$ due to a fundamental result by Erd\H{o}s.

Abstract: Consider a semigraph $G=(V,\,E)$; in this paper, we study the eigenvalues of the Laplacian matrix of $G$. We show that the Laplacian of $G$ is positive semi-definite, and $G$ is connected if and only if $\lambda_2 >0.$ Along the similar lines of graph theory bounds on the largest eigenvalue, we obtain upper and lower bounds on the largest Laplacian eigenvalue of G and enumerate the Laplacian eigenvalues of some special semigraphs such as star semigraph, rooted 3-uniform semigraph tree.

Abstract: Given a graph $G$, a set $X$ of vertices in $G$ satisfying that between every two vertices in $X$ (respectively, in $G$) there is a shortest path whose internal vertices are not in $X$ is a mutual-visibility (respectively, total mutual-visibility) set in $G$. The cardinality of a largest (total) mutual-visibility set in $G$ is known under the name (total) mutual-visibility number, and has been studied in several recent works. In this paper, we propose two lower variants of the mentioned concepts, defined as the smallest possible cardinality among all maximal (total) mutual-visibility sets in $G$, and denote them by $\mu^{-}(G)$ and $\mu_t^{-}(G)$, respectively. While the total mutual-visibility number is never larger than the mutual-visibility number in a graph $G$, we prove that both differences $\mu^{-}(G)-\mu_t^{-}(G)$ and $\mu_t^{-}(G)-\mu^{-}(G)$ can be arbitrarily large. We characterize graphs $G$ with some small values of $\mu^{-}(G)$ and $\mu_t^{-}(G)$, and prove a useful tool called Neighborhood Lemma, which enables us to find upper bounds on the lower mutual-visibility number in several classes of graphs. We compare the lower mutual-visibility number with the lower general position number, and find a close relationship with Bollob\'{a}s-Wessel theorem when this number is considered in Cartesian products of complete graphs. Finally, we also prove the NP-completeness of the decision problem related to $\mu_t^{-}(G)$.

Abstract: We prove that the Catalan Lie idempotent $D_n(a,b)$, introduced in [Menous {\it et al.}, Adv. Appl. Math. 51 (2013), 177] can be refined by introducing $n$ independent parameters $a_0,\ldots,a_{n-1}$ and that the coefficient of each monomial is itself a Lie idempotent in the descent algebra. These new idempotents are multiplicity-free sums of subsets of the Poincar\'e-Birkhoff-Witt basis of the Lie module. These results are obtained by embedding noncommutative symmetric functions into the dual noncommutative Connes-Kreimer algebra, which also allows us to interpret, and rederive in a simpler way, Chapoton's results on a two-parameter tree expanded series.

Abstract: Let $G$ be a connected compact group equipped with the normalised Haar measure $\mu$. Our first result shows that given $\alpha, \beta>0$, there is a constant $c = c(\alpha,\beta)>0$ such that for any compact sets $A,B\subseteq G$ with $ \alpha\mu(B)\geq\mu(A)\geq \mu(B) $ and $ \mu(A)+\mu(B)\leq 1-\beta$, there exist $b_1,\dots b_c\in B$ such that \[ \mu(A\cdot \{b_1,\dots,b_c\})\geq \mu(A)+\mu(B).\] A special case of this, that is, when $G=\mathbb{T}^d$, confirms a recent conjecture of Bollob\'as, Leader and Tiba. We also prove a quantitatively stronger version of such a result in the discrete setting of $\mathbb{R}^d$. Thus, given $d \in \mathbb{N}$, we show that there exists $c = c(d) >0$ such that for any finite, non-empty set $A \subseteq \mathbb{R}^d$ which is not contained in a translate of a hyperplane, one can find $a_1, \dots, a_c \in A$ satisfying \[ |A+ \{a_1, \dots, a_c\}| \geq (d+1)|A| - O_d(1). \] The main term here is optimal and recovers the bounds given by Freiman's lemma up to the $O_d(1)$ error term.

Abstract: A \emph{thrackle} is a graph drawn in the plane so that every pair of its edges meet exactly once, either at a common end vertex or in a proper crossing. Conway's thrackle conjecture states that the number of edges is at most the number of vertices. It is known that this conjecture holds for linear thrackles, i.e., when the edges are drawn as straight line segments. We consider \emph{convex hull thrackles}, a recent generalization of linear thrackles from segments to convex hulls of subsets of points. We prove that if the points are in convex position then the number of convex hulls is at most the number of vertices, but in general there is a construction with one more convex hull. On the other hand, we prove that the number of convex hulls is always at most twice the number of vertices.

Abstract: Clar number and Fries number are two thoroughly investigated parameters of plane graphs emerging from mathematical chemistry to measure stability of organic molecules. We consider first a common generalization of these two concepts for bipartite plane graphs, and then extend it to a framework on general (not necessarily planar) directed graphs. The corresponding optimization problem can be transformed into a maximum weight feasible tension problem which is the linear programming dual of a minimum cost network flow (or circulation) problem. Therefore the approach gives rise to a min-max theorem and to a strongly polynomial algorithm that relies exclusively on standard network flow subroutines. In particular, we give the first network flow based algorithm for an optimal Fries structure and its variants.