Bounds on the Game Transversal Number in Hypergraphs

Let $H = (V,E)$ be a hypergraph with vertex set $V$ and edge set $E$ of order \nH = |V| and size \mH = |E|. A transversal in $H$ is a subset of vertices in $H$ that has a nonempty intersection with every edge of $H$. A vertex hits an edge if it belongs to that edge. The transversal game played on $H$ involves of two players, \emph{Edge-hitter} and \emph{Staller}, who take turns choosing a vertex from $H$. Each vertex chosen must hit at least one edge not hit by the vertices previously chosen. The game ends when the set of vertices chosen becomes a transversal in $H$. Edge-hitter wishes to minimize the number of vertices chosen in the game, while Staller wishes to maximize it. The \emph{game transversal number}, $\tau_g(H)$, of $H$ is the number of vertices chosen when Edge-hitter starts the game and both players play optimally. We compare the game transversal number of a hypergraph with its transversal number, and also present an important fact concerning the monotonicity of $\tau_g$, that we call the Transversal Continuation Principle. It is known that if $H$ is a hypergraph with all edges of size at least~$2$, and $H$ is not a $4$-cycle, then \tau_g(H) \le \frac{4}{11}(\nH+\mH); and if $H$ is a (loopless) graph, then \tau_g(H) \le \frac{1}{3}(\nH + \mH + 1). We prove that if $H$ is a $3$-uniform hypergraph, then \tau_g(H) \le \frac{5}{16}(\nH + \mH), and if $H$ is $4$-uniform, then \tau_g(H) \le \frac{71}{252}(\nH + \mH).Comment: 23 pages

Rainbow perfect matchings in r-partite graph structures

A matching M in an edge–colored (hyper)graph is rainbow if each pair of edges in M have distinct colors. We extend the result of Erdos and Spencer on the existence of rainbow perfect matchings in the complete bipartite graph Kn,n to complete bipartite multigraphs, dense regular bipartite graphs and complete r-partite r-uniform hypergraphs. The proof of the results use the Lopsided version of the Local Lovász Lemma.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

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

Antichain cutsets of strongly connected posets

Rival and Zaguia showed that the antichain cutsets of a finite Boolean lattice are exactly the level sets. We show that a similar characterization of antichain cutsets holds for any strongly connected poset of locally finite height. As a corollary, we get such a characterization for semimodular lattices, supersolvable lattices, Bruhat orders, locally shellable lattices, and many more. We also consider a generalization to strongly connected hypergraphs having finite edges.Comment: 12 pages; v2 contains minor fixes for publicatio

Achieving New Upper Bounds for the Hypergraph Duality Problem through Logic

The hypergraph duality problem DUAL is defined as follows: given two simple hypergraphs $\mathcal{G}$ and $\mathcal{H}$, decide whether $\mathcal{H}$ consists precisely of all minimal transversals of $\mathcal{G}$ (in which case we say that $\mathcal{G}$ is the dual of $\mathcal{H}$). This problem is equivalent to deciding whether two given non-redundant monotone DNFs are dual. It is known that non-DUAL, the complementary problem to DUAL, is in $\mathrm{GC}(\log^2 n,\mathrm{PTIME})$, where $\mathrm{GC}(f(n),\mathcal{C})$ denotes the complexity class of all problems that after a nondeterministic guess of $O(f(n))$ bits can be decided (checked) within complexity class $\mathcal{C}$. It was conjectured that non-DUAL is in $\mathrm{GC}(\log^2 n,\mathrm{LOGSPACE})$. In this paper we prove this conjecture and actually place the non-DUAL problem into the complexity class $\mathrm{GC}(\log^2 n,\mathrm{TC}^0)$ which is a subclass of $\mathrm{GC}(\log^2 n,\mathrm{LOGSPACE})$. We here refer to the logtime-uniform version of $\mathrm{TC}^0$, which corresponds to $\mathrm{FO(COUNT)}$, i.e., first order logic augmented by counting quantifiers. We achieve the latter bound in two steps. First, based on existing problem decomposition methods, we develop a new nondeterministic algorithm for non-DUAL that requires to guess $O(\log^2 n)$ bits. We then proceed by a logical analysis of this algorithm, allowing us to formulate its deterministic part in $\mathrm{FO(COUNT)}$. From this result, by the well known inclusion $\mathrm{TC}^0\subseteq\mathrm{LOGSPACE}$, it follows that DUAL belongs also to $\mathrm{DSPACE}[\log^2 n]$. Finally, by exploiting the principles on which the proposed nondeterministic algorithm is based, we devise a deterministic algorithm that, given two hypergraphs $\mathcal{G}$ and $\mathcal{H}$, computes in quadratic logspace a transversal of $\mathcal{G}$ missing in $\mathcal{H}$.Comment: Restructured the presentation in order to be the extended version of a paper that will shortly appear in SIAM Journal on Computin

Hipergráfok = Hypergraphs

A projekt célkitűzéseit sikerült megvalósítani. A négy év során több mint száz kiváló eredmény született, amiből eddig 84 dolgozat jelent meg a téma legkiválóbb folyóirataiban, mint Combinatorica, Journal of Combinatorial Theory, Journal of Graph Theory, Random Graphs and Structures, stb. Számos régóta fennálló sejtést bebizonyítottunk, egész régi nyitott problémát megoldottunk hipergráfokkal kapcsolatban illetve kapcsolódó területeken. A problémák némelyike sok éve, olykor több évtizede nyitott volt. Nem egy közvetlen kutatási eredmény, de szintén bizonyos értékmérő, hogy a résztvevők egyike a Norvég Királyi Akadémia tagja lett és elnyerte a Steele díjat. | We managed to reach the goals of the project. We achieved more than one hundred excellent results, 84 of them appeared already in the most prestigious journals of the subject, like Combinatorica, Journal of Combinatorial Theory, Journal of Graph Theory, Random Graphs and Structures, etc. We proved several long standing conjectures, solved quite old open problems in the area of hypergraphs and related subjects. Some of the problems were open for many years, sometimes for decades. It is not a direct research result but kind of an evaluation too that a member of the team became a member of the Norvegian Royal Academy and won Steele Prize