A Quadratic Algorithm for Finding Next-to-Shortest Paths in Graphs

Given an edge-weighted undirected graph G and two prescribed vertices u and v, a next-to-shortest (u,v)-path is a shortest (u,v)-path amongst all (u,v)-paths having length strictly greater than the length of a shortest (u,v)-path. In this paper, we deal with the problem of computing a next-to-shortest (u,v)-path. We propose an O(n²){\mathcal{O}}(n^{2}) time algorithm for solving this problem, which significantly improves the bound of a previous one in O(n³){\mathcal{O}}(n^{3}) time where n is the number of vertices in G.     

On edge connectivity of direct products of graphs

Let λ(G) be the edge connectivity of G. The direct product of graphs G and H is the graph with vertex set V(G×H)=V(G)×V(H), where two vertices (u₁,v₁) and (u₂,v₂) are adjacent in G×H if u₁u₂∈E(G) and v₁v₂∈E(H). We prove that λ(G×Kn)=min{n(n−1)λ(G),(n−1)δ(G)} for every nontrivial graph G and n?3. We also prove that for almost every pair of graphs G and H with n vertices and edge probability p, G×H is k-connected, where k=O(²(n/logn)).     

Improved upper bounds on the L(2,1) -labeling of the skew and converse skew product graphs

An L(2,1)-labeling of a graph G is a function f from the vertex set V(G) to the set of all nonnegative integers such that |f(x)−f(y)|≥2 if d(x,y)=1 and |f(x)−f(y)|≥1 if d(x,y)=2, where d(x,y) denotes the distance between x and y in G. The L(2,1)-labeling number λ(G) of G is the smallest number k such that G has an L(2,1)-labeling with max{f(v):vV(G)}=k. Griggs and Yeh conjecture that λ(G)≤Δ² for any simple graph with maximum degree Δ≥2. This paper considers the graph formed by the skew product and the converse skew product of two graphs with a new approach on the analysis of adjacency matrices of the graphs as in [W.C. Shiu, Z. Shao, K.K. Poon, D. Zhang, A new approach to the L(2,1)-labeling of some products of graphs, IEEE Trans. Circuits Syst. II: Express Briefs (to appear)] and improves the previous upper bounds significantly.     

On the oriented chromatic number of grids

In this paper, we focus on the oriented coloring of graphs. Oriented coloring is a coloring of the vertices of an oriented graph G without symmetric arcs such that (i) no two neighbors in G are assigned the same color, and (ii) if two vertices u and v such that (u,v)∈A(G) are assigned colors c(u) and c(v), then for any (z,t)∈A(G), we cannot have simultaneously c(z)=c(v) and c(t)=c(u). The oriented chromatic number of an unoriented graph G is the smallest number k of colors for which any of the orientations of G can be colored with k colors.The main results we obtain in this paper are bounds on the oriented chromatic number of particular families of planar graphs, namely 2-dimensional grids, fat trees and fat fat trees.     

Lucky labelings of graphs

Suppose the vertices of a graph G were labeled arbitrarily by positive integers, and let S(v) denote the sum of labels over all neighbors of vertex v. A labeling is lucky if the function S is a proper coloring of G, that is, if we have S(u)≠S(v) whenever u and v are adjacent. The least integer k for which a graph G has a lucky labeling from the set {1,2,…,k} is the lucky number of G, denoted by η(G).Using algebraic methods we prove that η(G)?k+1 for every bipartite graph G whose edges can be oriented so that the maximum out-degree of a vertex is at most k. In particular, we get that η(T)?2 for every tree T, and η(G)?3 for every bipartite planar graph G. By another technique we get a bound for the lucky number in terms of the acyclic chromatic number. This gives in particular that for every planar graph G. Nevertheless we offer a provocative conjecture that η(G)?χ(G) for every graph G.     

Improved algorithm for finding next-to-shortest paths

We study the problem of finding the next-to-shortest paths in a weighted undirected graph. A next-to-shortest (u,v)-path is a shortest (u,v)-path amongst (u,v)-paths with length strictly greater than the length of the shortest (u,v)-path. The first polynomial algorithm for this problem was presented in [I. Krasikov, S.D. Noble, Finding next-to-shortest paths in a graph, Inform. Process. Lett. 92 (2004) 117-119]. We improve the upper bound from O(n³m) to O(n³).     

All-Pairs Bottleneck Paths in Vertex Weighted Graphs

Let G=(V,E,w) be a directed graph, where w:V→ℝ is a weight function defined on its vertices. The bottleneck weight, or the capacity, of a path is the smallest weight of a vertex on the path. For two vertices u,v the capacity from u to v, denoted by c(u,v), is the maximum bottleneck weight of a path from u to v. In the All-Pairs Bottleneck Paths (APBP) problem the task is to find the capacities for all ordered pairs of vertices. Our main result is an O(n ^2.575) time algorithm for APBP. The exponent is derived from the exponent of fast matrix multiplication.     

The super laceability of the hypercubes

A k-containerC(u,v) of a graph G is a set of k disjoint paths joining u to v. A k-container C(u,v) is a k∗-container if every vertex of G is incident with a path in C(u,v). A bipartite graph G is k∗-laceable if there exists a k∗-container between any two vertices u, v from different partite set of G. A bipartite graph G with connectivity k is super laceable if it is i∗-laceable for all i?k. A bipartite graph G with connectivity k is f-edge fault-tolerant super laceable if G−F is i∗-laceable for any 1?i?k−f and for any edge subset F with |F|=f<k−1. In this paper, we prove that the hypercube graph Q_r is super laceable. Moreover, Q_r is f-edge fault-tolerant super laceable for any f?r−2.     

New Plain-Exponential Time Classes for Graph Homomorphism

A homomorphism from a graph G to a graph H (in this paper, both simple, undirected graphs) is a mapping f:V(G)→V(H) such that if uv∈E(G) then f(u)f(v)∈E(H). The problem Hom (G,H) of deciding whether there is a homomorphism is NP-complete, and in fact the fastest known algorithm for the general case has a running time of O ^*(n(H) ^cn(G)) (the notation O ^*(⋅) signifies that polynomial factors have been ignored) for a constant 0<c<1. In this paper, we consider restrictions on the graphs G and H such that the problem can be solved in plain-exponential time, i.e. in time O ^*(c ^n(G)+n(H)) for some constant c.     

On circular-L(2, 1)-labellings of products of graphs

Let m, j and k be positive integers. An m-circular-L(j, k)-labelling of a graph G is an assignment f from { 0, 1,?…?, m?1} to the vertices of G such that, for any two vertices u and v, |f(u)?f(v)|_m≥j if uv∈E(G), and |f(u)?f(v)|_m≥k if d_G(u, v)=2, where |a|_m=min{a, m?a}. The minimum m such that G has an m-circular-L(j, k)-labelling is called the circular-L(j, k)-labelling number of G. This paper determines the circular-L(2, 1)-labelling numbers of the direct product of a path and a complete graph and of the Cartesian product of a path and a cycle.     

Inverse degree and super edge-connectivity

Let G be a connected graph of order n, minimum degree δ(G) and edge connectivity λ(G). The graph G is called maximally edge-connected if λ(G)=δ(G), and super edge-connected if every minimum edge-cut consists of edges incident with a vertex of minimum degree. Define the inverse degree of G with no isolated vertices as R(G)=∑ _v∈V(G)1/d(v), where d(v) denotes the degree of the vertex v. We show that if R(G)<2+(n?2δ)/(n?δ) (n?δ?1), then G is super edge-connected. We also give an analogous result for triangle-free graphs.     

Adjacent vertex-distinguishing edge and total chromatic numbers of hypercubes

An adjacent vertex-distinguishing edge coloring of a simple graph G is a proper edge coloring of G such that incident edge sets of any two adjacent vertices are assigned different sets of colors. A total coloring of a graph G is a coloring of both the edges and the vertices. A total coloring is proper if no two adjacent or incident elements receive the same color. An adjacent vertex-distinguishing total coloring h of a simple graph G=(V,E) is a proper total coloring of G such that H(u)≠H(v) for any two adjacent vertices u and v, where H(u)={h(wu)|wu∈E(G)}∪{h(u)} and H(v)={h(xv)|xv∈E(G)}∪{h(v)}. The minimum number of colors required for an adjacent vertex-distinguishing edge coloring (resp. an adjacent vertex-distinguishing total coloring) of G is called the adjacent vertex-distinguishing edge chromatic number (resp. adjacent vertex-distinguishing total chromatic number) of G and denoted by (resp. χat(G)). In this paper, we consider the adjacent vertex-distinguishing edge chromatic number and adjacent vertex-distinguishing total chromatic number of the hypercube Qn, prove that for n?3 and χat(Qn)=Δ(Qn)+2 for n?2.     

A generalization of concavity for finite differences

The concept of concavity is generalized to discrete functions, u, satisfying the n^th-order difference inequality, (−1)^n−kΔⁿu(m) ≥ 0, M = 0, 1,..., N and the homogeneous boundary conditions, u(0) = … = u(k−1) = 0, u(N + k + 1) = … = u(N + n) = 0 for some k “1, …, n − 1”. A piecewise polynomial is constructed which bounds u below. The piecewise polynomial is employed to obtain a positive lower bound on u(m) for m = k, …, N + k, where the lower bound is proportional to the supremum of u. An analogous bound is obtained for a related Green's function.     

Bandwidth on AT-free graphs

We study the classical Bandwidth problem from the viewpoint of parametrised algorithms. Given a graph G=(V,E) and a positive integer k, the Bandwidth problem asks whether there exists a bijective function β:{1,…,∣V∣}→V such that for every edge uv∈E, ∣β⁻¹(u)−β⁻¹(v)∣≤k. It is known that under standard complexity assumptions, no algorithm for Bandwidth with running time of the form f(k)n^O(1) exists, even when the input is restricted to trees. We initiate the search for classes of graphs where such algorithms do exist. We present an algorithm with running time n⋅2^O(klogk) for Bandwidth on AT-free graphs, a well-studied graph class that contains interval, permutation, and cocomparability graphs. Our result is the first non-trivial algorithm that shows fixed-parameter tractability of Bandwidth on a graph class on which the problem remains NP-complete.     

Geodesic pancyclicity and balanced pancyclicity of Augmented cubes

For two distinct vertices u,v∈V(G), a cycle is called geodesic cycle with u and v if a shortest path of G joining u and v lies on the cycle; and a cycle C is called balanced cycle with u and v if dC(u,v)=max{dC(x,y)|x,y∈V(C)}. A graph G is pancyclic [J. Mitchem, E. Schmeichel, Pancyclic and bipancyclic graphs a survey, Graphs and applications (1982) 271-278] if it contains a cycle of every length from 3 to |V(G)| inclusive. A graph G is called geodesic pancyclic [H.C. Chan, J.M. Chang, Y.L. Wang, S.J. Horng, Geodesic-pancyclic graphs, in: Proceedings of the 23rd Workshop on Combinatorial Mathematics and Computation Theory, 2006, pp. 181-187] (respectively, balanced pancyclic) if for each pair of vertices u,v∈V(G), it contains a geodesic cycle (respectively, balanced cycle) of every integer length of l satisfying max{2dG(u,v),3}?l?|V(G)|. Lai et al. [P.L. Lai, J.W. Hsue, J.J.M. Tan, L.H. Hsu, On the panconnected properties of the Augmented cubes, in: Proceedings of the 2004 International Computer Symposium, 2004, pp. 1249-1251] proved that the n-dimensional Augmented cube, AQn, is pancyclic in the sense that a cycle of length l exists, 3?l?|V(AQn)|. In this paper, we study two new pancyclic properties and show that AQn is geodesic pancyclic and balanced pancyclic for n?2.     

Radio number of ladder graphs

Let G be a connected graph with diameter diam(G). The radio number for G, denoted by rn(G), is the smallest integer k such that there exists a function f: V(G)→{0, 1, 2, …, k} with the following satisfied for all vertices u and v:|f(u)?f(v)|≥diam (G)?d _G (u, v)+1, where d _G (u, v) is the distance between u and v in G. In this paper, we determine the radio number of ladder graphs.     

Hamiltonian connectivity and globally 3∗-connectivity of dual-cube extensive networks

In 2000, Li et al. introduced dual-cube networks, denoted by DC_n for n?1, using the hypercube family Q_n and showed the vertex symmetry and some fault-tolerant hamiltonian properties of DC_n. In this article, we introduce a new family of interconnection networks called dual-cube extensive networks, denoted by DCEN(G). Given any arbitrary graph G, DCEN(G) is generated from G using the similar structure of DC_n. We show that if G is a nonbipartite and hamiltonian connected graph, then DCEN(G) is hamiltonian connected. In addition, if G has the property that for any two distinct vertices u,v of G, there exist three disjoint paths between u and v such that these three paths span the graph G, then DCEN(G) preserves the same property. Furthermore, we prove that the similar results hold when G is a bipartite graph.     

A new sufficient condition for Hamiltonicity of graphs

Rahman and Kaykobad proved the following theorem on Hamiltonian paths in graphs. Let G be a connected graph with n vertices. If d(u)+d(v)+δ(u,v)?n+1 for each pair of distinct non-adjacent vertices u and v in G, where δ(u,v) is the length of a shortest path between u and v in G, then G has a Hamiltonian path. It is shown that except for two families of graphs a graph is Hamiltonian if it satisfies the condition in Rahman and Kaykobad's theorem. The result obtained in this note is also an answer for a question posed by Rahman and Kaykobad.     

Constructing the nearly shortest path in crossed cubes

A graph G is panconnected if each pair of distinct vertices u,v∈V(G) are joined by a path of length l for all d_G(u,v)?l?|V(G)|-1, where d_G(u,v) is the length of a shortest path joining u and v in G. Recently, Fan et. al. [J. Fan, X. Lin, X. Jia, Optimal path embedding in crossed cubes, IEEE Trans. Parall. Distrib. Syst. 16 (2) (2005) 1190-1200, J. Fan, X. Jia, X. Lin, Complete path embeddings in crossed cubes, Inform. Sci. 176 (22) (2006) 3332-3346] and Xu et. al. [J.M. Xu, M.J. Ma, M. Lu, Paths in Möbius cubes and crossed cubes, Inform. Proc. Lett. 97 (3) (2006) 94-97] both proved that n-dimensional crossed cube, CQ_n, is almost panconnected except the path of length d_CQn(u,v)+1 for any two distinct vertices u,v∈V(CQ_n). In this paper, we give a necessary and sufficient condition to check for the existence of paths of length d_CQn(u,v)+1, called the nearly shortest paths, for any two distinct vertices u,v in CQ_n. Moreover, we observe that only some pair of vertices have no nearly shortest path and we give a construction scheme for the nearly shortest path if it exists.     

Paths in Möbius cubes and crossed cubes

The Möbius cube MQn and the crossed cube CQn are two important variants of the hypercube Qn. This paper shows that for any two different vertices u and v in G∈{MQn,CQn} with n?3, there exists a uv-path of every length from dG(u,v)+2 to n²−1 except for a shortest uv-path, where dG(u,v) is the distance between u and v in G. This result improves some known results.