On minimal vertex separators of dually chordal graphs: properties and characterizations

Many works related to dually chordal graphs, their cliques and neighborhoods were published by Brandstädt et al. (1998) [1] and Gutierrez (1996) [6]. We will undertake a similar study by considering minimal vertex separators and their properties instead. We find a necessary and sufficient condition for every minimal vertex separator to be contained in the closed neighborhood of a vertex and two major characterizations of dually chordal graphs are proved. The first states that a graph is dually chordal if and only if it possesses a spanning tree such that every minimal vertex separator induces a subtree. The second says that a graph is dually chordal if and only if the family of minimal vertex separators is Helly, its intersection graph is chordal and each of its members induces a connected subgraph. We also found adaptations for them, requiring just O(|E(G)|) minimal vertex separators if they are conveniently chosen. We obtain at the end a proof of a known characterization of the class of hereditary dually chordal graphs that relies on the properties of minimal vertex separators.Fil: de Caria, Pablo Jesús. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Departamento de Matemáticas; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata; ArgentinaFil: Gutierrez, Marisa. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas. Departamento de Matemáticas; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata; Argentin

Maxclique and unit disk characterizations of strongly chordal graphs

Maxcliques (maximal complete subgraphs) and unit disks (closed neighborhoods of vertices) sometime play almost interchangeable roles in graph theory. For instance, interchanging them makes two existing characterizations of chordal graphs into two new characterizations. More intriguingly, these characterizations of chordal graphs can be naturally strengthened to new characterizations of strongly chordal graphs.Facultad de Ciencias Exacta

Decomposing 1-Sperner hypergraphs

A hypergraph is Sperner if no hyperedge contains another one. A Sperner hypergraph is equilizable (resp., threshold) if the characteristic vectors of its hyperedges are the (minimal) binary solutions to a linear equation (resp., inequality) with positive coefficients. These combinatorial notions have many applications and are motivated by the theory of Boolean functions and integer programming. We introduce in this paper the class of $1$-Sperner hypergraphs, defined by the property that for every two hyperedges the smallest of their two set differences is of size one. We characterize this class of Sperner hypergraphs by a decomposition theorem and derive several consequences from it. In particular, we obtain bounds on the size of $1$-Sperner hypergraphs and their transversal hypergraphs, show that the characteristic vectors of the hyperedges are linearly independent over the reals, and prove that $1$-Sperner hypergraphs are both threshold and equilizable. The study of $1$-Sperner hypergraphs is motivated also by their applications in graph theory, which we present in a companion paper