Interval total colorings of graphs

A total coloring of a graph $G$ is a coloring of its vertices and edges such that no adjacent vertices, edges, and no incident vertices and edges obtain the same color. An \emph{interval total $t$-coloring} of a graph $G$ is a total coloring of $G$ with colors $1,2,\...,t$ such that at least one vertex or edge of $G$ is colored by $i$, $i=1,2,\...,t$, and the edges incident to each vertex $v$ together with $v$ are colored by $d_{G}(v)+1$ consecutive colors, where $d_{G}(v)$ is the degree of the vertex $v$ in $G$. In this paper we investigate some properties of interval total colorings. We also determine exact values of the least and the greatest possible number of colors in such colorings for some classes of graphs.Comment: 23 pages, 1 figur

Interval non-edge-colorable bipartite graphs and multigraphs

An edge-coloring of a graph $G$ with colors $1,...,t$ is called an interval $t$-coloring if all colors are used, and the colors of edges incident to any vertex of $G$ are distinct and form an interval of integers. In 1991 Erd\H{o}s constructed a bipartite graph with 27 vertices and maximum degree 13 which has no interval coloring. Erd\H{o}s's counterexample is the smallest (in a sense of maximum degree) known bipartite graph which is not interval colorable. On the other hand, in 1992 Hansen showed that all bipartite graphs with maximum degree at most 3 have an interval coloring. In this paper we give some methods for constructing of interval non-edge-colorable bipartite graphs. In particular, by these methods, we construct three bipartite graphs which have no interval coloring, contain 20,19,21 vertices and have maximum degree 11,12,13, respectively. This partially answers a question that arose in [T.R. Jensen, B. Toft, Graph coloring problems, Wiley Interscience Series in Discrete Mathematics and Optimization, 1995, p. 204]. We also consider similar problems for bipartite multigraphs.Comment: 18 pages, 7 figure