English

Bounded twin-width graphs are polynomially $\chi$-bounded

Discrete Mathematics 2025-01-20 v3 Combinatorics

Abstract

We show that every graph with twin-width tt has chromatic number O(ωkt)O(\omega ^{k_t}) for some integer ktk_t, where ω\omega denotes the clique number. This extends a quasi-polynomial bound from Pilipczuk and Soko{\l}owski and generalizes a result for bounded clique-width graphs by Bonamy and Pilipczuk. The proof uses the main ideas of the quasi-polynomial approach, with a different treatment of the decomposition tree. In particular, we identify two types of extensions of a class of graphs: the delayed-extension (which preserves polynomial χ\chi-boundedness) and the right-extension (which preserves polynomial χ\chi-boundedness under bounded twin-width condition). Our main result is that every bounded twin-width graph is a delayed extension of simpler classes of graphs, each expressed as a bounded union of right extensions of lower twin-width graphs.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2303.11231,
  title  = {Bounded twin-width graphs are polynomially $\chi$-bounded},
  author = {Romain Bourneuf and Stéphan Thomassé},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2303.11231},
  year   = {2025}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-28T09:24:30.110Z