English

Kempe changes in $H$-free graphs

Combinatorics 2025-12-02 v1

Abstract

Given a kk-colouring of a graph GG and two of the colours, a KempeKempe chainchain is a connected component of the subgraph of GG induced by the vertices coloured with one of these two colours. A KempeKempe swapswap changes one colouring into another by interchanging the colours of the vertices in a Kempe chain. Two colourings are KempeKempe equivalentequivalent if each can be obtained from the other by a series of Kempe swaps; the set of Kempe equivalent colourings is called a KempeKempe classclass. For a graph GG, let χ(G)\chi(G) denote its chromatic number and let Ck(G)\mathcal{C}_{k}(G) denote the set of all kk-colourings of GG. We say GG is KempeKempe connectedconnected if for all kχ(G)k\ge \chi(G), Ck(G)\mathcal{C}_{k}(G) forms a Kempe class. For a graph HH, graph GG is called HH-freefree if no induced subgraph of GG is isomorphic to HH. We prove that every HH-free graph is Kempe connected if and only if HH is an induced subgraph of the path on four vertices, P4P_4. The graph 2K2K_2 consists of four vertices and two edges which are not adjacent. We prove that for all p0p\ge 0, there is a kk-colourable 2K2K_2-free graph GG such that Ck+p(G)\mathcal{C}_{k+p}(G) does not form a Kempe class.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2512.00695,
  title  = {Kempe changes in $H$-free graphs},
  author = {Manoj Belavadi and Kathie Cameron},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2512.00695},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

11 pages

R2 v1 2026-07-01T08:01:19.454Z