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In an attempt to understanding the complexity of the independent set problem, Chv{\'a}tal defined t-perfect graphs. While a full characterization of this class is still at large, progress has been achieved for claw-free graphs [Bruhn and…

Discrete Mathematics · Computer Science 2022-11-08 Yixin Cao , Shenghua Wang

Hadwiger's conjecture asserts that if a simple graph $G$ has no $K_{t+1}$ minor, then its vertex set $V(G)$ can be partitioned into $t$ stable sets. This is still open, but we prove under the same hypotheses that $V(G)$ can be partitioned…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2015-12-24 Katherine Edwards , Dong Yeap Kang , Jaehoon Kim , Sang-il Oum , Paul Seymour

We prove two distinct and natural refinements of a recent breakthrough result of Molloy (and a follow-up work of Bernshteyn) on the (list) chromatic number of triangle-free graphs. In both our results, we permit the amount of colour made…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2021-03-05 Ewan Davies , Rémi de Joannis de Verclos , Ross J. Kang , François Pirot

Mader proved that for every integer $t$ there is a smallest real number $c(t)$ such that any graph with average degree at least $c(t)$ must contain a $K_t$-minor. Fiorini, Joret, Theis and Wood conjectured that any graph with $n$ vertices…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2015-06-12 Richard Montgomery

We study the chromatic number of graphs that exclude a clique as a strong odd immersion and have independence number two. Given a graph $G$ and $t\in\mathbb{Z}^+$, we prove that if $\alpha(G)\leq 2$ and $G$ has no strong odd…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2026-05-06 Henry Echeverría , Jessica McDonald

Finding the maximum number of maximal independent sets in an $n$-vertex graph $G$, $i(G)$, from a restricted class is an extensively studied problem. Let $kK_2$ denote the matching of size $k$, that is a graph with $2k$ vertices and $k$…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2016-06-21 Nikola Yolov

A conjecture of Alon, Krivelevich, and Sudakov states that, for any graph $F$, there is a constant $c_F > 0$ such that if $G$ is an $F$-free graph of maximum degree $\Delta$, then $\chi(G) \leq c_F \Delta / \log\Delta$. Alon, Krivelevich,…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2022-01-25 James Anderson , Anton Bernshteyn , Abhishek Dhawan

Let $n(k_1, k_2)$ be the least integer $n$ such that there exists a graph on $n$ vertices in which every vertex is contained in both a clique of size $k_1$ and an independent set of size $k_2$. Recently, Feige and Pauzner showed that ${n(k,…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2026-04-24 Veronica Bitonti , Emma Hogan , Tommy Walker Mackay

For a sequence $(H_i)_{i=1}^k$ of graphs, let $\textrm{nim}(n;H_1,\ldots, H_k)$ denote the maximum number of edges not contained in any monochromatic copy of $H_i$ in colour $i$, for any colour $i$, over all $k$-edge-colourings of~$K_n$.…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2018-07-11 Hong Liu , Oleg Pikhurko , Maryam Sharifzadeh

A $k$-independent set in a connected graph is a set of vertices such that any two vertices in the set are at distance greater than $k$ in the graph. The $k$-independence number of a graph, denoted $\alpha_k$, is the size of a largest…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2023-05-01 Lord C. Kavi , Mike Newman

For given graph $H$, the independence number $\alpha(H)$ of $H$, is the size of the maximum independent set of $V(H)$. Finding the maximum independent set in a graph is a NP-hard problem. Another version of the independence number is…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2022-01-13 Yaser Rowshan

A graph $G$ is well-covered if all its maximal stable sets have the same size, denoted by alpha(G) (M. D. Plummer, 1970). If for any $k$ the $k$-th coefficient of a polynomial I(G;x) is equal to the number of stable sets of cardinality $k$…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2007-05-23 Vadim E. Levit , Eugen Mandrescu

A set of vertices is $k$-sparse if it induces a graph with a maximum degree of at most $k$. In this missive, we consider the order of the largest $k$-sparse set in a triangle-free graph of fixed order. We show, for example, that every…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-06-17 Tınaz Ekim , Burak Nur Erdem , John Gimbel

The Hadwiger number h(G) of a graph G is the maximum size of a complete minor of G. Hadwiger's Conjecture states that h(G) >= \chi(G). Since \chi(G) \alpha(G) >= |V(G)|, Hadwiger's Conjecture implies that \alpha(G) h(G) >= |V(G)|. We show…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2011-10-14 Jozsef Balogh , John Lenz , Hehui Wu

A variety of powerful extremal results have been shown for the chromatic number of triangle-free graphs. Three noteworthy bounds are in terms of the number of vertices, edges, and maximum degree given by Poljak \& Tuza (1994), and…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2023-10-13 David G. Harris

We consider the number of independent sets in hypergraphs, which allows us to define the independence density of countable hypergraphs. Hypergraph independence densities include a broad family of densities over graphs and relational…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2013-08-14 Anthony Bonato , Jason Brown , Dieter Mitsche , Pawel Pralat

Consider the following relaxation of the Hadwiger Conjecture: For each $t$ there exists $N_t$ such that every graph with no $K_t$-minor admits a vertex partition into $\ceil{\alpha t+\beta}$ parts, such that each component of the subgraph…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2011-10-05 David R. Wood

In this note we consider a more general version of local sparsity introduced recently by Anderson, Kuchukova, and the author. In particular, we say a graph $G = (V, E)$ is $(k, r)$-locally-sparse if for each vertex $v \in V(G)$, the…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-07-22 Abhishek Dhawan

Motivated by Hadwiger's conjecture, Seymour asked which graphs $H$ have the property that every non-null graph $G$ with no $H$ minor has a vertex of degree at most $|V(H)|-2$. We show that for every monotone graph family $\mathcal{F}$ with…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2025-10-29 Sergey Norin , Jérémie Turcotte

For $k\geq 1$, a $k$-colouring $c$ of $G$ is a mapping from $V(G)$ to $\{1,2,\ldots,k\}$ such that $c(u)\neq c(v)$ for any two non-adjacent vertices $u$ and $v$. The $k$-Colouring problem is to decide if a graph $G$ has a $k$-colouring. For…

Combinatorics · Mathematics 2021-01-21 Barnaby Martin , Daniel Paulusma , Siani Smith