Related papers: Exchange properties of finite set-systems

Given a plane forest $F = (V, E)$ of $|V| = n$ points, we find the minimum set $S \subseteq E$ of edges such that the edge-constrained minimum spanning tree over the set $V$ of vertices and the set $S$ of constraints contains $F$. We…

Cylindrical Algebraic Decomposition (CAD) algorithms typically produce a decomposition adapted to a finite family of semi-algebraic sets $\mathcal{F}$ (i.e. every member of $\mathcal{F}$ is a union of cells). Different algorithms may…

In standard bootstrap percolation, a subset A of the n x n grid is initially infected. A new site is then infected if at least two of its neighbours are infected, and an infected site stays infected forever. The set A is said to percolate…

This paper resolves two open problems in extremal set theory. For a family $\mathcal{F} \subseteq 2^{[n]}$ and $i, j\in [n]$, we denote $\mathcal{F} (i,\bar{j})=\{F\backslash\{i\}: F\in \mathcal{F}, F\cap\{i,j\}=\{i\}\}$. The sturdiness…

The problem of bounding the size of a set system under various intersection restrictions has a central place in extremal combinatorics. We investigate the maximum number of disjoint pairs a set system can have in this setting. In…

We improve the status of the problem of determining minimum-sized percolating sets in $a \times b \times c$ grids under the $3$-neighbour process. Using several new constructions, we show that optimal percolating sets exist whenever…

The Galvin problem asks for the minimum size of a family $\mathcal{F} \subseteq \binom{[n]}{n/2}$ with the property that, for any set $A$ of size $\frac n 2$, there is a set $S \in \mathcal{F}$ which is balanced on $A$, meaning that $|S…

We prove that every $n$ vertex linear triple system with $m$ edges has at least $m^6/n^7$ copies of a pentagon, provided $m>100 \, n^{3/2}$. This provides the first nontrivial bound for a question posed by Jiang and Yepremyan. More…

Let $G$ be a simple graph with $2n$ vertices and a perfect matching. The forcing number $f(G,M)$ of a perfect matching $M$ of $G$ is the smallest cardinality of a subset of $M$ that is contained in no other perfect matching of $G$. Among…

Let $t\ge 1$ be a given integer. Let ${\cal F}$ be a family of subsets of $[m]=\{1,2,\ldots,m\}$. Assume that for every pair of disjoint sets $S,T\subset [m]$ with $|S|=|T|=k$, there do not exist $2t$ sets in ${\cal F}$ where $t$ subsets of…

For a subgraph $G$ of the blow-up of a graph $F$, we let $\delta^*(G)$ be the smallest minimum degree over all of the bipartite subgraphs of $G$ induced by pairs of parts that correspond to edges of $F$. In [Triangle-factors in a balanced…

Let $[n]$ (resp. $V$) be an $n$-element set (resp. $n$-dimensional vector space over the finite field $\mathbb{F}_{q}$), and $\binom{[n]}{k}$ (resp. $\genfrac{[}{]}{0pt}{}{V}{k}$) denote the set of all $k$-subsets of $[n]$ (resp.…

Let $\mathcal F\subset 2^{[n]}$ be a family in which any three sets have non-empty intersection and any two sets have at least $38$ elements in common. The nearly best possible bound $|\mathcal F|\le 2^{n-2}$ is proved. We believe that $38$…

Let $\mathcal{F}\subseteq{[n]\choose k}$ be a $t$-intersecting family. Define the $t$-covering number $\tau_t(\mathcal{F})$ of $\mathcal{F}$ as the minimum size of a subset $S$ of $[n]$ with $|S\cap F|\geqslant t$ for each…

We study and solve several problems in two closely related settings: set families in $2^{[n]}$ with many disjoint pairs of sets and low rank matrices with many zero entries. - More than 40 years ago, Daykin and Erd\H{o}s asked for the…

Given a set $X$ and a sufficiently large integer $t$, let $\mathcal{F}$ be a family of $k$-subsets of $X$. The Kruskal-Katona theorem states that if $|\mathcal{F}|\geq \binom{t}{k}$, then $|\partial_{k-1}\mathcal{F}|\geq\binom{t}{k-1}$. The…

For a finite set $X$, we say that a set $H\subseteq X$ crosses a partition ${\cal P}=(X_1,\dots,X_k)$ of $X$ if $H$ intersects $\min (|H|,k)$ partition classes. If $|H|\geq k$, this means that $H$ meets all classes $X_i$, whilst for…

The Frankl conjecture, also known as the union-closed sets conjecture, states that in any finite non-empty union-closed family, there exists an element in at least half of the sets. From an optimization point of view, one could instead…

We prove that, for sufficiently large $n$, every graph of order $n$ with minimum degree at least $0.852n$ has a fractional edge-decomposition into triangles. We do this by refining a method used by Dross to establish a bound of $0.9n$. By a…

The $n$-cube is the poset obtained by ordering all subsets of $\{1,\ldots,n\}$ by inclusion, and it can be partitioned into $\binom{n}{\lfloor n/2\rfloor}$ chains, which is the minimum possible number. Two such decompositions of the…