Note on the trace of random walks on pseudorandom graphs

We study the graph-theoretic properties of the trace of random walks on pseudorandom graphs. We show that for any $\varepsilon>0$, there exists a constant $C$ such that the cover time of an $(n,d,\lambda)$-graph $G$ with $d/\lambda\ge C$ is at most $(1+\varepsilon)n\log n$, meaning the expected number of steps needed to reach all vertices at least once is at most $(1+\varepsilon)n\log n$ regardless of the starting vertex. Furthermore, we prove that with high probability, the trace of a random walk of length $(1+\varepsilon)n\log n$ on $G$ is Hamiltonian, regardless of the starting vertex. These results also hold for random $d$-regular graphs with sufficiently large $d$. These findings answer two questions proposed by Frieze, Krivelevich, Michaeli, and Peled [PLMS, 2018]. Notably, our results imply a bound on a stronger version of the cover time: with high probability, all vertices are covered after $(1+\varepsilon)n\log n$ steps, regardless of the starting vertex. Our proofs rely on the spectral properties of the adjacency matrix and the graph expansion. All results are asymptotically optimal.