English

A recursion for the twist polynomial of a one-point join of normal binary delta-matroids

Combinatorics 2025-11-13 v1

Abstract

The partial-dual Euler-genus polynomial was defined by Gross, Mansour, and Tucker to analyze how the Euler genus of a ribbon graph changes under partial duality, a generalization of Euler-Poincar\'{e} duality introduced by Chmutov. The twist polynomial defined by Yan and Jin extends the partial-dual Euler-genus polynomial to a polynomial on delta-matroids. We derive a recursion formula for the twist polynomial of a one-point join of looped simple graphs -- equivalently, normal, binary delta-matroids. Our recursion applies to the partial-dual Euler-genus polynomial as a special case, where it generalizes a recursion obtained by Yan and Jin. We obtain relations for the twist polynomial on looped simple graphs evaluated at 1/2-1/2 and for the twist polynomial of a graph with a single looped vertex. A characterization is given for the feasible sets of the delta-matroid associated to a one-point join of looped simple graphs. We show that Yan and Jin's recursion extends to the twist polynomial on delta-matroids.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2511.09504,
  title  = {A recursion for the twist polynomial of a one-point join of normal binary delta-matroids},
  author = {Charlton Li},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2511.09504},
  year   = {2025}
}

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17 pages