Critical Ising model and spanning trees partition functions

We prove that the squared partition function of the two-dimensional critical Ising model defined on a finite, isoradial graph $G=(V,E)$, is equal to $2^{|V|}$ times the partition function of spanning trees of the graph $\bar{G}$, where $\bar{G}$ is the graph $G$ extended along the boundary; edges of $G$ are assigned Kenyon's [Ken02] critical weights, and boundary edges of $\bar{G}$ have specific weights. The proof is an explicit construction, providing a new relation on the level of configurations between two classical, critical models of statistical mechanics.Comment: 38 pages, 26 figure

Deterministically Isolating a Perfect Matching in Bipartite Planar Graphs

We present a deterministic way of assigning small (log bit) weights to the edges of a bipartite planar graph so that the minimum weight perfect matching becomes unique. The isolation lemma as described in (Mulmuley et al. 1987) achieves the same for general graphs using a randomized weighting scheme, whereas we can do it deterministically when restricted to bipartite planar graphs. As a consequence, we reduce both decision and construction versions of the matching problem to testing whether a matrix is singular, under the promise that its determinant is 0 or 1, thus obtaining a highly parallel SPL algorithm for bipartite planar graphs. This improves the earlier known bounds of non-uniform SPL by (Allender et al. 1999) and $NC^2$ by (Miller and Naor 1995, Mahajan and Varadarajan 2000). It also rekindles the hope of obtaining a deterministic parallel algorithm for constructing a perfect matching in non-bipartite planar graphs, which has been open for a long time. Our techniques are elementary and simple

Statistical mechanics on isoradial graphs

Isoradial graphs are a natural generalization of regular graphs which give, for many models of statistical mechanics, the right framework for studying models at criticality. In this survey paper, we first explain how isoradial graphs naturally arise in two approaches used by physicists: transfer matrices and conformal field theory. This leads us to the fact that isoradial graphs provide a natural setting for discrete complex analysis, to which we dedicate one section. Then, we give an overview of explicit results obtained for different models of statistical mechanics defined on such graphs: the critical dimer model when the underlying graph is bipartite, the 2-dimensional critical Ising model, random walk and spanning trees and the q-state Potts model.Comment: 22 page

Immanantal invariants of graphs

AbstractSomething between an expository note and an extended research problem, this article is an invitation to expand the existing literature on a family of graph invariants rooted in linear and multilinear algebra. There are a variety of ways to assign a real n×n matrix K(G) to each n-vertex graph G, so that G and H are isomorphic if and only if K(G) and K(H) are permutation similar. It follows that G and H are isomorphic only if K(G) and K(H) are similar, i.e., that similarity invariants of K(G) are graph theoretic invariants of G, an observation that helps to explain the enormous literature on spectral graph theory. The focus of this article is the permutation part, i.e., on matrix functions that are preserved under permutation similarity if not under all similarity