scholarly journals A New Lower Bound on the Independence Number of a Graph and Applications

10.37236/3601 ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Henning ◽  
Christian Löwenstein ◽  
Justin Southey ◽  
Anders Yeo

The independence number of a graph $G$, denoted $\alpha(G)$, is the maximum cardinality of an independent set of vertices in $G$. The independence number is one of the most fundamental and well-studied graph parameters. In this paper, we strengthen a result of Fajtlowicz [Combinatorica 4 (1984), 35-38] on the independence of a graph given its maximum degree and maximum clique size. As a consequence of our result we give bounds on the independence number and transversal number of $6$-uniform hypergraphs with maximum degree three. This gives support for a conjecture due to Tuza and Vestergaard [Discussiones Math. Graph Theory 22 (2002), 199-210] that if $H$ is a $3$-regular $6$-uniform hypergraph of order $n$, then $\tau(H) \le n/4$.

10.37236/6160 ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Henning ◽  
Anders Yeo

For $k \ge 2$, let $H$ be a $k$-uniform hypergraph on $n$ vertices and $m$ edges. Let $S$ be a set of vertices in a hypergraph $H$. The set $S$ is a transversal if $S$ intersects every edge of $H$, while the set $S$ is strongly independent if no two vertices in $S$ belong to a common edge. The transversal number, $\tau(H)$, of $H$ is the minimum cardinality of a transversal in $H$, and the strong independence number of $H$, $\alpha(H)$, is the maximum cardinality of a strongly independent set in $H$. The hypergraph $H$ is linear if every two distinct edges of $H$ intersect in at most one vertex. Let $\mathcal{H}_k$ be the class of all connected, linear, $k$-uniform hypergraphs with maximum degree $2$. It is known [European J. Combin. 36 (2014), 231–236] that if $H \in \mathcal{H}_k$, then $(k+1)\tau(H) \le n+m$, and there are only two hypergraphs that achieve equality in the bound. In this paper, we prove a much more powerful result, and establish tight upper bounds on $\tau(H)$ and tight lower bounds on $\alpha(H)$ that are achieved for  infinite families of hypergraphs. More precisely, if $k \ge 3$ is odd and $H \in \mathcal{H}_k$ has $n$ vertices and $m$ edges, then we prove that $k(k^2 - 3)\tau(H) \le (k-2)(k+1)n + (k - 1)^2m + k-1$ and $k(k^2 - 3)\alpha(H) \ge  (k^2 + k - 4)n  - (k-1)^2 m - (k-1)$. Similar bounds are proven in the case when $k \ge 2$ is even.


2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (05) ◽  
pp. 1850069
Author(s):  
Nader Jafari Rad ◽  
Elahe Sharifi

The independence number of a graph [Formula: see text], denoted by [Formula: see text], is the maximum cardinality of an independent set of vertices in [Formula: see text]. [Henning and Löwenstein An improved lower bound on the independence number of a graph, Discrete Applied Mathematics  179 (2014) 120–128.] proved that if a connected graph [Formula: see text] of order [Formula: see text] and size [Formula: see text] does not belong to a specific family of graphs, then [Formula: see text]. In this paper, we strengthen the above bound for connected graphs with maximum degree at least three that have a non-cut-vertex of maximum degree. We show that if a connected graph [Formula: see text] of order [Formula: see text] and size [Formula: see text] has a non-cut-vertex of maximum degree then [Formula: see text], where [Formula: see text] is the maximum degree of the vertices of [Formula: see text]. We also characterize all connected graphs [Formula: see text] of order [Formula: see text] and size [Formula: see text] that have a non-cut-vertex of maximum degree and [Formula: see text].


10.37236/2646 ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yair Caro ◽  
Adriana Hansberg

Let $G = (V,E)$ be a graph and $k \ge 0$ an integer. A $k$-independent set $S \subseteq V$ is a set of vertices such that the maximum degree in the graph induced by $S$ is at most $k$. With $\alpha_k(G)$ we denote the maximum cardinality of a $k$-independent set of $G$. We prove that, for a graph $G$ on $n$ vertices and average degree $d$, $\alpha_k(G) \ge \frac{k+1}{\lceil d \rceil + k + 1} n$, improving the hitherto best general lower bound due to Caro and Tuza [Improved lower bounds on $k$-independence, J. Graph Theory 15 (1991), 99-107].


10.37236/7267 ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Henning ◽  
Anders Yeo

A set $S$ of vertices in a hypergraph $H$ is a transversal if it has a nonempty intersection with every edge of $H$. The upper transversal number $\Upsilon(H)$ of $H$ is the maximum cardinality of a minimal transversal in $H$. We show that if $H$ is a connected $3$-uniform hypergraph of order $n$, then $\Upsilon(H) > 1.4855 \sqrt[3]{n} - 2$. For $n$ sufficiently large, we construct infinitely many connected $3$-uniform hypergraphs, $H$, of order~$n$ satisfying $\Upsilon(H) < 2.5199 \sqrt[3]{n}$. We conjecture that $\displaystyle{\sup_{n \to \infty}  \, \left( \inf  \frac{ \Upsilon(H) }{ \sqrt[3]{n} } \right) = \sqrt[3]{16} }$, where the infimum is taken over all connected $3$-uniform hypergraphs $H$ of order $n$.


10.37236/5304 ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Henning ◽  
Anders Yeo

Let $H$ be a $4$-uniform hypergraph on $n$ vertices. The transversal number $\tau(H)$ of $H$ is the minimum number of vertices that intersect every edge. The result in [J. Combin. Theory Ser. B 50 (1990), 129—133] by Lai and Chang implies that $\tau(H) \le 7n/18$ when $H$ is $3$-regular. The main result in [Combinatorica 27 (2007), 473—487] by Thomassé and Yeo implies an improved bound of $\tau(H) \le 8n/21$. We provide a further improvement and prove that $\tau(H) \le 3n/8$, which is best possible due to a hypergraph of order eight. More generally, we show that if $H$ is a $4$-uniform hypergraph on $n$ vertices and $m$ edges with maximum degree $\Delta(H) \le 3$, then $\tau(H) \le n/4 + m/6$, which proves a known conjecture. We show that an easy corollary of our main result is that if $H$ is a $4$-uniform hypergraph with $n$ vertices and $n$ edges, then $\tau(H) \le \frac{3}{7}n$, which was the main result of the Thomassé-Yeo paper [Combinatorica 27 (2007), 473—487].


2017 ◽  
Vol 09 (02) ◽  
pp. 1750023 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nacéra Meddah ◽  
Mustapha Chellali

A Roman dominating function (RDF) on a graph [Formula: see text] is a function [Formula: see text] satisfying the condition that every vertex [Formula: see text] with [Formula: see text] is adjacent to at least one vertex [Formula: see text] of [Formula: see text] for which [Formula: see text]. The weight of a RDF is the sum [Formula: see text], and the minimum weight of a RDF [Formula: see text] is the Roman domination number [Formula: see text]. A subset [Formula: see text] of [Formula: see text] is a [Formula: see text]-independent set of [Formula: see text] if every vertex of [Formula: see text] has at most one neighbor in [Formula: see text] The maximum cardinality of a [Formula: see text]-independent set of [Formula: see text] is the [Formula: see text]-independence number [Formula: see text] Both parameters are incomparable in general, however, we show that if [Formula: see text] is a tree, then [Formula: see text]. Moreover, all extremal trees attaining equality are characterized.


2015 ◽  
Vol 07 (03) ◽  
pp. 1550039
Author(s):  
I. Sahul Hamid ◽  
R. Gnanaprakasam ◽  
M. Fatima Mary

A set S ⊆ V(G) is an independent set if no two vertices of S are adjacent. An independent set S such that 〈V - S〉 is connected is called an outer-connected independent set(oci-set). An oci-set is maximal if it is not a proper subset of any oci-set. The minimum and maximum cardinality of a maximal oci-set are called respectively the outer-connected independence number and the upper outer-connected independence number. This paper initiates a study of these parameters.


2016 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-87 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bartłomiej Bosek ◽  
Sebastian Czerwiński ◽  
Jarosław Grytczuk ◽  
Paweł Rzążewski

A harmonious coloring of a k-uniform hypergraph H is a vertex coloring such that no two vertices in the same edge share the same color, and each k-element subset of colors appears on at most one edge. The harmonious number h(H) is the least number of colors needed for such a coloring. We prove that k-uniform hypergraphs of bounded maximum degree ? satisfy h(H) = O(k?k!m), where m is the number of edges in H which is best possible up to a multiplicative constant. Moreover, for every fixed ?, this constant tends to 1 with k ? ?. We use a novel method, called entropy compression, that emerged from the algorithmic version of the Lov?sz Local Lemma due to Moser and Tardos.


2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 132-158 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tariq A. Chishti ◽  
Guofei Zhou ◽  
Shariefuddin Pirzada ◽  
Antal Iványi

Abstract Let H be an r-uniform hypergraph with r ≥ 2 and let α(H) be its vertex independence number. In the paper bounds of α(H) are given for different uniform hypergraphs: if H has no isolated vertex, then in terms of the degrees, and for triangle-free linear H in terms of the order and average degree.


2017 ◽  
Vol 09 (06) ◽  
pp. 1750078 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jose Torres-Jimenez ◽  
Jose Carlos Perez-Torres ◽  
Gildardo Maldonado-Martinez

A hypergraph [Formula: see text] with vertex set [Formula: see text] and edge set [Formula: see text] differs from a graph in that an edge can connect more than two vertices. An r-uniform hypergraph [Formula: see text] is a hypergraph with hyperedges of size [Formula: see text]. For an r-uniform hypergraph [Formula: see text], an r-uniform clique is a subset [Formula: see text] of [Formula: see text] such as every subset of [Formula: see text] elements of [Formula: see text] belongs to [Formula: see text]. We present hClique, an exact algorithm to find a maximum r-uniform clique for [Formula: see text]-uniform graphs. In order to evidence the performance of hClique, 32 random [Formula: see text]-graphs were solved.


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