Group Colorability and Hamiltonian Properties of Graphs

The research of my dissertation was motivated by the conjecture of Thomassen that every 4-connected line graph is hamiltonian and by the conjecture of Matthews and Sumner that every 4-connected claw-free graph is hamiltonian. Towards the hamiltonian line graph problem, we proved that every 3-edge-connected, essentially 4-edge-connected graph G has a spanning eulerian subgraph, if for every pair of adjacent vertices u and v, dG(u) + dG(v) ≥ 9. A straight forward corollary is that every 4-connected, essentially 6-connected line graph with minimum degree at least 7 is hamiltonian.;We also investigate graphs G such that the line graph L(G) is hamiltonian connected when L( G) is 4-connected. Ryjacek and Vrana recently further conjectured that every 4-connected line graph is hamiltonian-connected. In 2001, Kriesell proved that every 4-connected line graph of a claw free graph is hamiltonian connected. Recently, Lai et al showed that every 4-connected line graph of a quasi claw free graph is hamiltonian connected, and that every 4-connected line graph of an almost claw free graph is hamiltonian connected. In 2009, Broersma and Vumer discovered the P3-dominating (P3D) graphs as a superfamily that properly contains all quasi claw free graphs, and in particular, all claw-free graphs. Here we prove that every 4-connected line graph of a P3D graph is hamiltonian connected, which extends several former results in this area.;R. Gould [15] asked what natural graph properties of G and H are sufficient to imply that the product of G and H is hamiltonian. We first investigate the sufficient and necessary conditions for G x H being hamiltonian or traceable when G is a hamiltonian graph and H is a tree. Then we further investigate sufficient and necessary conditions for G x H being hamiltonian connected, or edge-pancyclic, or pan-connected.;The problem of group colorings of graphs is also investigated in this dissertation. Group coloring was first introduced by Jeager et al. [21]. They introduced a concept of group connectivity as a generalization of nowhere-zero flows. They also introduced group coloring as a dual concept to group connectivity. Prior research on group chromatic number was restricted to simple graphs, and considered only Abelian groups in the definition of chi g(G). The behavior of group coloring for multigraphs is different to that of simple graphs. Thus we extend the definition of group coloring by considering general groups (both Abelian groups and non-Abelian groups), and investigate the properties of chig for multigraphs by proving an analogue to Brooks\u27 Theorem

Sets as graphs

The aim of this thesis is a mutual transfer of computational and structural results and techniques between sets and graphs. We study combinatorial enumeration of sets, canonical encodings, random generation, digraph immersions. We also investigate the underlying structure of sets in algorithmic terms, or in connection with hereditary graphs classes. Finally, we employ a set-based proof-checker to verify two classical results on claw-free graph

On hamiltonicity of P3-dominated graphs

We introduce a new class of graphs which we call P₃-dominated graphs. This class properly contains all quasi-claw-free graphs, and hence all claw-free graphs. Let G be a 2-connected P₃-dominated graph. We prove that G is hamiltonian if α(G²) ≤ κ(G), with two exceptions: K₂,₃ and K₁,₁,₃. We also prove that G is hamiltonian, if G is 3-connected and |V(G)| ≤ 5δ(G) − 5. These results extend known results on (quasi-)claw-free graphs

On 3-connected hamiltonian line graphs

AbstractThomassen conjectured that every 4-connected line graph is hamiltonian. It has been proved that every 4-connected line graph of a claw-free graph, or an almost claw-free graph, or a quasi-claw-free graph, is hamiltonian. In 1998, Ainouche et al. [2] introduced the class of DCT graphs, which properly contains both the almost claw-free graphs and the quasi-claw-free graphs. Recently, Broersma and Vumar (2009) [5] found another family of graphs, called P3D graphs, which properly contain all quasi-claw-free graphs. In this paper, we investigate the hamiltonicity of 3-connected line graphs of DCT graphs and P3D graphs, and prove that if G is a DCT graph or a P3D graph with κ(L(G))≥3 and if L(G) does not have an independent vertex 3-cut, then L(G) is hamiltonian. Consequently, every 4-connected line graph of a DCT graph or a P3D graph is hamiltonian