5,206 research outputs found
Spanning forests and the vector bundle Laplacian
The classical matrix-tree theorem relates the determinant of the
combinatorial Laplacian on a graph to the number of spanning trees. We
generalize this result to Laplacians on one- and two-dimensional vector
bundles, giving a combinatorial interpretation of their determinants in terms
of so-called cycle rooted spanning forests (CRSFs). We construct natural
measures on CRSFs for which the edges form a determinantal process. This theory
gives a natural generalization of the spanning tree process adapted to graphs
embedded on surfaces. We give a number of other applications, for example, we
compute the probability that a loop-erased random walk on a planar graph
between two vertices on the outer boundary passes left of two given faces. This
probability cannot be computed using the standard Laplacian alone.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/10-AOP596 the Annals of
Probability (http://www.imstat.org/aop/) by the Institute of Mathematical
Statistics (http://www.imstat.org
Diameter and Treewidth in Minor-Closed Graph Families
It is known that any planar graph with diameter D has treewidth O(D), and
this fact has been used as the basis for several planar graph algorithms. We
investigate the extent to which similar relations hold in other graph families.
We show that treewidth is bounded by a function of the diameter in a
minor-closed family, if and only if some apex graph does not belong to the
family. In particular, the O(D) bound above can be extended to bounded-genus
graphs. As a consequence, we extend several approximation algorithms and exact
subgraph isomorphism algorithms from planar graphs to other graph families.Comment: 15 pages, 12 figure
Processes on Unimodular Random Networks
We investigate unimodular random networks. Our motivations include their
characterization via reversibility of an associated random walk and their
similarities to unimodular quasi-transitive graphs. We extend various theorems
concerning random walks, percolation, spanning forests, and amenability from
the known context of unimodular quasi-transitive graphs to the more general
context of unimodular random networks. We give properties of a trace associated
to unimodular random networks with applications to stochastic comparison of
continuous-time random walk.Comment: 66 pages; 3rd version corrects formula (4.4) -- the published version
is incorrect --, as well as a minor error in the proof of Proposition 4.10;
4th version corrects proof of Proposition 7.1; 5th version corrects proof of
Theorem 5.1; 6th version makes a few more minor correction
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