Combinatorics (math.CO)

Abstract: Partite, $3$-uniform hypergraphs are $3$-uniform hypergraphs in which each hyperedge contains exactly one point from each of the $3$ disjoint vertex classes. We consider the degree sequence problem of partite, $3$-uniform hypergraphs, that is, to decide if such a hypergraph with prescribed degree sequences exists. We prove that this decision problem is NP-complete in general, and give a polynomial running time algorithm for third almost-regular degree sequences, that is, when each degree in one of the vertex classes is $k$ or $k-1$ for some fixed $k$, and there is no restriction for the other two vertex classes. We also consider the sampling problem, that is, to uniformly sample partite, $3$-uniform hypergraphs with prescribed degree sequences. We propose a Parallel Tempering method, where the hypothetical energy of the hypergraphs measures the deviation from the prescribed degree sequence. The method has been implemented and tested on synthetic and real data. It can also be applied for $\chi^2$ testing of contingency tables. We have shown that this hypergraph-based $\chi^2$ test is more sensitive than the standard $\chi^2$ test. The extra sensitivity is especially advantageous on small data sets, where the proposed Parallel Tempering method shows promising performance.

Abstract: The $r$-color size-Ramsey number of a $k$-uniform hypergraph~$H$, denoted by $\hat{R}_r(H)$, is the minimum number of edges in a $k$-uniform hypergraph $G$ such that for every $r$-coloring of the edges of $G$ there exists a monochromatic copy of $H$. When $H$ is a graph path, it is known that $\Omega(r^2n)=\hat{R}_r(P_n)=O((r^2\log r)n)$ with the best bounds essentially due to Krivelevich. Letzter, Pokrovskiy, and Yepremyan~\cite{LPY} recently proved that, for the $k$-uniform tight path $P_{n}^{(k)}$, $\hat{R}_r(P_{n}^{(k)})=O_{r,k}(n)$. We consider the problem of giving a lower bound on $\hat{R}_r(P_{n}^{(k)})$ (for fixed $k$ and growing $r$). We show that $\hat{R}_r(P_n^{(k)})=\Omega_k(r^kn)$. In the case $k=3$, we give a more precise estimate which in particular improves the best known lower bound for $2$ colors due to Winter; i.e. we show $\hat{R}(P^{(3)}_{n})\geq \frac{28}{9}n-30$. All of our results above generalize to $\ell$-overlapping $k$-uniform paths $P_{n}^{(k, \ell)}$. In general we have $\hat{R}_r ( P_{n}^{(k, \ell)} ) = \Omega_k( r^{\left\lfloor \frac{k}{k-\ell} \right\rfloor } n)$, and when $1\leq \ell\leq \frac{k}{2}$ we have $\hat{R}_r(P_{n}^{(k, \ell)})=\Omega_k(r^{2}n)$.

Abstract: Motivated by the appearance of embeddings in the theory of chip firing and the critical group of a graph, we introduce a version of the critical group (or sandpile group) for combinatorial maps, that is, for graphs embedded in orientable surfaces. We provide several definitions of our critical group, by approaching it through analogues of the cycle-cocycle matrix, the Laplacian matrix, and as the group of critical states of a chip firing game (or sandpile model) on the edges of a map. Our group can be regarded as a perturbation of the classical critical group of its underlying graph by topological information, and it agrees with the classical critical group in the plane case. Its cardinality is equal to the number of spanning quasi-trees in a connected map, just as the cardinality of the classical critical group is equal to the number of spanning trees of a connected graph. Our approach exploits the properties of principally unimodular matrices and the methods of delta-matroid theory.

Abstract: Let $H$ be a graph with $\chi(H) = r+1$. Simonovits's theorem states that, if $H$ is edge-critical, the unique largest $H$-free subgraph of $K_n$ is its largest $r$-partite subgraph, provided that $n$ is sufficiently large. We show that the same holds with $K_n$ replaced by the binomial random graph $G_{n,p}$ whenever $H$ is also strictly $2$-balanced and $p \ge (\theta_H+o(1)) n^{-\frac{1}{m_2(H)}} (\log n)^{\frac{1}{e_H-1}}$ for some explicit constant $\theta_H$, which we believe to be optimal. This (partially) resolves a conjecture of DeMarco and Kahn.

Abstract: Catalan observed in 1874 that the numbers $S(m,n) = \frac{(2m)! (2n)!}{m! n! (m+n)!}$, now called the super Catalan numbers, are integers but there is still no known combinatorial interpretation for them in general, although interpretations have been given for the case $m=2$ and for $S(m, m+s)$ for $0 \leq s \leq 3$. In this paper, we define the super FiboCatalan numbers $S(m,n)_F = \frac{F_{2m}! F_{2n}!}{F_m! F_n! F_{m+n}!}$ and prove they are integers for $m=1$ and $m=2$. In addition, we prove that $S(m, m+s)_F$ is an integer for $0 \leq s \leq 4$.

Abstract: We say that a sequence $a_1 \cdots a_{2t}$ of integers is repetitive if $a_i = a_{i+t}$ for every $i\in\{1,\ldots,t\}$. A walk in a graph $G$ is a sequence $v_1 \cdots v_r$ of vertices of $G$ in which $v_iv_{i+1}\in E(G)$ for every $i\in\{1,\ldots,r-1\}$. Given a $k$-coloring $c\colon V(G)\to\{1,\ldots,k\}$ of $V(G)$, we say that $c$ is walk-nonrepetitive (resp. stroll-nonrepetitive) if for every $t\in\mathbb{N}$ and every walk $v_1\cdots v_{2t}$ the sequence $c(v_1) \cdots c(v_{2t})$ is not repetitive unless $v_i = v_{i+t}$ for every $i\in\{1,\ldots,t\}$ (resp. unless $v_i = v_{i+t}$ for some $i\in\{1,\ldots,t\}$). The walk (resp. stroll) chromatic number $\sigma(G)$ (resp. $\rho(G)$) of $G$ is the minimum $k$ for which $G$ has a walk-nonrepetitive (resp. stroll-nonrepetitive) $k$-coloring. Let $C_n$ and $P_n$ denote, respectively, the cycle and the path with $n$ vertices. In this paper we present three results that answer questions posed by Bar\'at and Wood in 2008: (i) $\sigma(C_n) = 4$ whenever $n\geq 4$ and $n \notin\{5,7\}$; (ii) $\rho(P_n) = 3$ if $3\leq n\leq 21$ and $\rho(P_n) = 4$ otherwise; and (iii) $\rho(C_n) = 4$, whenever $n \notin\{3,4,6,8\}$, and $\rho(C_n) = 3$ otherwise. In particular, (ii) improves bounds on $n$ obtained by Tao in 2023.

Abstract: For $B \subseteq \mathbb F_q^m$, the $n$-th affine extremal number of $B$ is the maximum cardinality of a set $A \subseteq \mathbb F_q^n$ with no subset which is affinely isomorphic to $B$. Furstenberg and Katznelson proved that for any $B \subseteq \mathbb F_q^m$, the $n$-th affine extremal number of $B$ is $o(q^n)$ as $n \to \infty$. By counting affine homomorphisms between subsets of $\mathbb F_q^n$, we derive new bounds and give new proofs of some previously known bounds for certain affine extremal numbers. At the same time, we establish corresponding supersaturation results. We connect these bounds to certain Ramsey-type numbers in vector spaces over finite fields. For $s,t \geq 1$, let $R_q(s,t)$ denote the minimum $n$ such that in every red-blue coloring of the one-dimensional subspaces of $\mathbb F_q^n$, there is either a red $s$-dimensional subspace or a blue $t$-dimensional subspace of $\mathbb F_q^n$. The existence of these numbers is a special case of a well-known theorem of Graham, Leeb, Rothschild. We improve the best known upper bounds on $R_2(2,t)$, $R_3(2,t)$, $R_2(t,t)$, and $R_3(t,t)$.