Boxicity and Cubicity of Product Graphs

The 'boxicity' ('cubicity') of a graph G is the minimum natural number k such that G can be represented as an intersection graph of axis-parallel rectangular boxes (axis-parallel unit cubes) in $R^k$. In this article, we give estimates on the boxicity and the cubicity of Cartesian, strong and direct products of graphs in terms of invariants of the component graphs. In particular, we study the growth, as a function of $d$, of the boxicity and the cubicity of the $d$-th power of a graph with respect to the three products. Among others, we show a surprising result that the boxicity and the cubicity of the $d$-th Cartesian power of any given finite graph is in $O(\log d / \log\log d)$ and $\theta(d / \log d)$, respectively. On the other hand, we show that there cannot exist any sublinear bound on the growth of the boxicity of powers of a general graph with respect to strong and direct products.Comment: 14 page

Boxicity and Cubicity of Asteroidal Triple free graphs

An axis parallel $d$-dimensional box is the Cartesian product $R_1 \times R_2 \times ... \times R_d$ where each $R_i$ is a closed interval on the real line. The {\it boxicity} of a graph $G$, denoted as \boxi(G), is the minimum integer $d$ such that $G$ can be represented as the intersection graph of a collection of $d$-dimensional boxes. An axis parallel unit cube in $d$-dimensional space or a $d$-cube is defined as the Cartesian product $R_1 \times R_2 \times ... \times R_d$ where each $R_i$ is a closed interval on the real line of the form $[a_i,a_i + 1]$. The {\it cubicity} of $G$, denoted as \cub(G), is the minimum integer $d$ such that $G$ can be represented as the intersection graph of a collection of $d$-cubes. Let $S(m)$ denote a star graph on $m+1$ nodes. We define {\it claw number} of a graph $G$ as the largest positive integer $k$ such that $S(k)$ is an induced subgraph of $G$ and denote it as \claw. Let $G$ be an AT-free graph with chromatic number $\chi(G)$ and claw number \claw. In this paper we will show that \boxi(G) \leq \chi(G) and this bound is tight. We also show that \cub(G) \leq \boxi(G)(\ceil{\log_2 \claw} +2) $\leq$ \chi(G)(\ceil{\log_2 \claw} +2). If $G$ is an AT-free graph having girth at least 5 then \boxi(G) \leq 2 and therefore \cub(G) \leq 2\ceil{\log_2 \claw} +4.Comment: 15 pages: We are replacing our earlier paper regarding boxicity of permutation graphs with a superior result. Here we consider the boxicity of AT-free graphs, which is a super class of permutation graph

Cubicity of interval graphs and the claw number

Let $G(V,E)$ be a simple, undirected graph where $V$ is the set of vertices and $E$ is the set of edges. A $b$-dimensional cube is a Cartesian product $I_1\times I_2\times...\times I_b$, where each $I_i$ is a closed interval of unit length on the real line. The \emph{cubicity} of $G$, denoted by \cub(G) is the minimum positive integer $b$ such that the vertices in $G$ can be mapped to axis parallel $b$-dimensional cubes in such a way that two vertices are adjacent in $G$ if and only if their assigned cubes intersect. Suppose $S(m)$ denotes a star graph on $m+1$ nodes. We define \emph{claw number} $\psi(G)$ of the graph to be the largest positive integer $m$ such that $S(m)$ is an induced subgraph of $G$. It can be easily shown that the cubicity of any graph is at least \ceil{\log_2\psi(G)}. In this paper, we show that, for an interval graph $G$ \ceil{\log_2\psi(G)}\le\cub(G)\le\ceil{\log_2\psi(G)}+2. Till now we are unable to find any interval graph with \cub(G)>\ceil{\log_2\psi(G)}. We also show that, for an interval graph $G$, \cub(G)\le\ceil{\log_2\alpha}, where $\alpha$ is the independence number of $G$. Therefore, in the special case of $\psi(G)=\alpha$, \cub(G) is exactly \ceil{\log_2\alpha}. The concept of cubicity can be generalized by considering boxes instead of cubes. A $b$-dimensional box is a Cartesian product $I_1\times I_2\times...\times I_b$, where each $I_i$ is a closed interval on the real line. The \emph{boxicity} of a graph, denoted $box(G)$, is the minimum $k$ such that $G$ is the intersection graph of $k$-dimensional boxes. It is clear that box(G)\le\cub(G). From the above result, it follows that for any graph $G$, \cub(G)\le box(G)\ceil{\log_2\alpha}

Boxicity and topological invariants

The boxicity of a graph $G=(V,E)$ is the smallest integer $k$ for which there exist $k$ interval graphs $G_i=(V,E_i)$, $1 \le i \le k$, such that $E=E_1 \cap \cdots \cap E_k$. In the first part of this note, we prove that every graph on $m$ edges has boxicity $O(\sqrt{m \log m})$, which is asymptotically best possible. We use this result to study the connection between the boxicity of graphs and their Colin de Verdi\`ere invariant, which share many similarities. Known results concerning the two parameters suggest that for any graph $G$, the boxicity of $G$ is at most the Colin de Verdi\`ere invariant of $G$, denoted by $\mu(G)$. We observe that every graph $G$ has boxicity $O(\mu(G)^4(\log \mu(G))^2)$, while there are graphs $G$ with boxicity $\Omega(\mu(G)\sqrt{\log \mu(G)})$. In the second part of this note, we focus on graphs embeddable on a surface of Euler genus $g$. We prove that these graphs have boxicity $O(\sqrt{g}\log g)$, while some of these graphs have boxicity $\Omega(\sqrt{g \log g})$. This improves the previously best known upper and lower bounds. These results directly imply a nearly optimal bound on the dimension of the adjacency poset of graphs on surfaces.Comment: 6 page

Boxicity of Line Graphs

Boxicity of a graph H, denoted by box(H), is the minimum integer k such that H is an intersection graph of axis-parallel k-dimensional boxes in R^k. In this paper, we show that for a line graph G of a multigraph, box(G) <= 2\Delta(\lceil log_2(log_2(\Delta)) \rceil + 3) + 1, where \Delta denotes the maximum degree of G. Since \Delta <= 2(\chi - 1), for any line graph G with chromatic number \chi, box(G) = O(\chi log_2(log_2(\chi))). For the d-dimensional hypercube H_d, we prove that box(H_d) >= (\lceil log_2(log_2(d)) \rceil + 1)/2. The question of finding a non-trivial lower bound for box(H_d) was left open by Chandran and Sivadasan in [L. Sunil Chandran and Naveen Sivadasan. The cubicity of Hypercube Graphs. Discrete Mathematics, 308(23):5795-5800, 2008]. The above results are consequences of bounds that we obtain for the boxicity of fully subdivided graphs (a graph which can be obtained by subdividing every edge of a graph exactly once).Comment: 14 page