Digraphs and homomorphisms: Cores, colorings, and constructions

A natural digraph analogue of the graph-theoretic concept of an `independent set\u27 is that of an acyclic set, namely a set of vertices not spanning a directed cycle. Hence a digraph analogue of a graph coloring is a decomposition of the vertex set into acyclic sets

Uniquely D-colourable digraphs with large girth

Let C and D be digraphs. A mapping $f:V(D)\to V(C)$ is a C-colouring if for every arc $uv$ of D, either $f(u)f(v)$ is an arc of C or $f(u)=f(v)$, and the preimage of every vertex of C induces an acyclic subdigraph in D. We say that D is C-colourable if it admits a C-colouring and that D is uniquely C-colourable if it is surjectively C-colourable and any two C-colourings of D differ by an automorphism of C. We prove that if a digraph D is not C-colourable, then there exist digraphs of arbitrarily large girth that are D-colourable but not C-colourable. Moreover, for every digraph D that is uniquely D-colourable, there exists a uniquely D-colourable digraph of arbitrarily large girth. In particular, this implies that for every rational number $r\geq 1$, there are uniquely circularly r-colourable digraphs with arbitrarily large girth.Comment: 21 pages, 0 figures To be published in Canadian Journal of Mathematic

Distance-two labelings of digraphs

For positive integers $j\ge k$, an $L(j,k)$-labeling of a digraph $D$ is a function $f$ from $V(D)$ into the set of nonnegative integers such that $|f(x)-f(y)|\ge j$ if $x$ is adjacent to $y$ in $D$ and $|f(x)-f(y)|\ge k$ if $x$ is of distant two to $y$ in $D$. Elements of the image of $f$ are called labels. The $L(j,k)$-labeling problem is to determine the $\vec{\lambda}_{j,k}$-number $\vec{\lambda}_{j,k}(D)$ of a digraph $D$, which is the minimum of the maximum label used in an $L(j,k)$-labeling of $D$. This paper studies $\vec{\lambda}_{j,k}$- numbers of digraphs. In particular, we determine $\vec{\lambda}_{j,k}$- numbers of digraphs whose longest dipath is of length at most 2, and $\vec{\lambda}_{j,k}$-numbers of ditrees having dipaths of length 4. We also give bounds for $\vec{\lambda}_{j,k}$-numbers of bipartite digraphs whose longest dipath is of length 3. Finally, we present a linear-time algorithm for determining $\vec{\lambda}_{j,1}$-numbers of ditrees whose longest dipath is of length 3.Comment: 12 pages; presented in SIAM Coference on Discrete Mathematics, June 13-16, 2004, Loews Vanderbilt Plaza Hotel, Nashville, TN, US

New Bounds for the Dichromatic Number of a Digraph

The chromatic number of a graph $G$, denoted by $\chi(G)$, is the minimum $k$ such that $G$ admits a $k$-coloring of its vertex set in such a way that each color class is an independent set (a set of pairwise non-adjacent vertices). The dichromatic number of a digraph $D$, denoted by $\chi_A(D)$, is the minimum $k$ such that $D$ admits a $k$-coloring of its vertex set in such a way that each color class is acyclic. In 1976, Bondy proved that the chromatic number of a digraph $D$ is at most its circumference, the length of a longest cycle. Given a digraph $D$, we will construct three different graphs whose chromatic numbers bound $\chi_A(D)$. Moreover, we prove: i) for integers $k\geq 2$, $s\geq 1$ and $r_1, \ldots, r_s$ with $k\geq r_i\geq 0$ and $r_i\neq 1$ for each $i\in[s]$, that if all cycles in $D$ have length $r$ modulo $k$ for some $r\in\{r_1,\ldots,r_s\}$, then $\chi_A(D)\leq 2s+1$; ii) if $D$ has girth $g$ and there are integers $k$ and $p$, with $k\geq g-1\geq p\geq 1$ such that $D$ contains no cycle of length $r$ modulo $\lceil \frac{k}{p} \rceil p$ for each $r\in \{-p+2,\ldots,0,\ldots,p\}$, then $\chi_A (D)\leq \lceil \frac{k}{p} \rceil$; iii) if $D$ has girth $g$, the length of a shortest cycle, and circumference $c$, then $\chi_A(D)\leq \lceil \frac{c-1}{g-1} \rceil +1$, which improves, substantially, the bound proposed by Bondy. Our results show that if we have more information about the lengths of cycles in a digraph, then we can improve the bounds for the dichromatic number known until now.Comment: 14 page

D-colorable digraphs with large girth

In 1959 Paul Erdos (Graph theory and probability, Canad. J. Math. 11 (1959), 34-38) famously proved, nonconstructively, that there exist graphs that have both arbitrarily large girth and arbitrarily large chromatic number. This result, along with its proof, has had a number of descendants (D. Bokal, G. Fijavz, M. Juvan, P.M. Kayll and B. Mohar, The circular chromatic number of a digraph, J. Graph Theory 46 (2004), 227-240; B. Bollobas and N. Sauer, Uniquely colourable graphs with large girth, Canad. J. Math. 28 (1976), 1340-1344; J. Nesetril and X. Zhu, On sparse graphs with given colorings and homomorphisms, J. Combin. Theory Ser. B 90 (2004), 161-172; X. Zhu, Uniquely H-colorable graphs with large girth, J. Graph Theory 23 (1996), 33-41) that have extended and generalized the result while strengthening the techniques used to achieve it. We follow the lead of Xuding Zhu (op. cit.) who proved that, for a suitable graph H, there exist graphs of arbitrarily large girth that are uniquely H-colorable. We establish an analogue of Zhu\u27s results in a digraph setting. Let C and D be digraphs. A mapping f:V(D)&rarr V(C) is a C-coloring if for every arc uv of D, either f(u)f(v) is an arc of C or f(u)=f(v), and the preimage of every vertex of C induces an acyclic subdigraph in D. We say that D is C-colorable if it admits a C-coloring and that D is uniquely C-colorable if it is surjectively C-colorable and any two C-colorings of D differ by an automorphism of C. We prove that if D is a digraph that is not C-colorable, then there exist graphs of arbitrarily large girth that are D-colorable but not C-colorable. Moreover, for every digraph D that is uniquely D-colorable, there exists a uniquely D-colorable digraph of arbitrarily large girth

On the Complexity of Digraph Colourings and Vertex Arboricity

It has been shown by Bokal et al. that deciding 2-colourability of digraphs is an NP-complete problem. This result was later on extended by Feder et al. to prove that deciding whether a digraph has a circular $p$-colouring is NP-complete for all rational $p>1$. In this paper, we consider the complexity of corresponding decision problems for related notions of fractional colourings for digraphs and graphs, including the star dichromatic number, the fractional dichromatic number and the circular vertex arboricity. We prove the following results: Deciding if the star dichromatic number of a digraph is at most $p$ is NP-complete for every rational $p>1$. Deciding if the fractional dichromatic number of a digraph is at most $p$ is NP-complete for every $p>1, p \neq 2$. Deciding if the circular vertex arboricity of a graph is at most $p$ is NP-complete for every rational $p>1$. To show these results, different techniques are required in each case. In order to prove the first result, we relate the star dichromatic number to a new notion of homomorphisms between digraphs, called circular homomorphisms, which might be of independent interest. We provide a classification of the computational complexities of the corresponding homomorphism colouring problems similar to the one derived by Feder et al. for acyclic homomorphisms.Comment: 21 pages, 1 figur