Remarks on a Ramsey theory for trees

Extending Furstenberg's ergodic theoretic proof for Szemer\'edi's theorem on arithmetic progressions, Furstenberg and Weiss (2003) proved the following qualitative result. For every d and k, there exists an integer N such that no matter how we color the vertices of a complete binary tree T_N of depth N with k colors, we can find a monochromatic replica of T_d in T_N such that (1) all vertices at the same level in T_d are mapped into vertices at the same level in T_N; (2) if a vertex x of T_d is mapped into a vertex y in T_N, then the two children of x are mapped into descendants of the the two children of y in T_N, respectively; and 3 the levels occupied by this replica form an arithmetic progression. This result and its density versions imply van der Waerden's and Szemer\'edi's theorems, and laid the foundations of a new Ramsey theory for trees. Using simple counting arguments and a randomized coloring algorithm called random split, we prove the following related result. Let N=N(d,k) denote the smallest positive integer such that no matter how we color the vertices of a complete binary tree T_N of depth N with k colors, we can find a monochromatic replica of T_d in T_N which satisfies properties (1) and (2) above. Then we have N(d,k)=\Theta(dk\log k). We also prove a density version of this result, which, combined with Szemer\'edi's theorem, provides a very short combinatorial proof of a quantitative version of the Furstenberg-Weiss theorem.Comment: 10 pages 1 figur

Strolling through Paradise

With each of the usual tree forcings I (e.g., I = Sacks forcing S, Laver forcing L, Miller forcing M, Mathias forcing R, etc.) we associate a sigma--ideal i^0 on the reals as follows: A \in i^0 iff for all T \in I there is S \leq T (i.e. S is stronger than T or, equivalently, S is a subtree of T) such that A \cap [S] = \emptyset, where [S] denotes the set of branches through S. So, s^0 is the ideal of Marczewski null sets, r^0 is the ideal of Ramsey null sets (nowhere Ramsey sets) etc. We show (in ZFC) that whenever i^0, j^0 are two such ideals, then i^0 \sem j^0 \neq \emptyset. E.g., for I=S and J=R this gives a Marczewski null set which is not Ramsey, extending earlier partial results by Aniszczyk, Frankiewicz, Plewik, Brown and Corazza and answering a question of the latter. In case I=M and J=L this gives a Miller null set which is not Laver null; this answers a question addressed by Spinas. We also investigate the question which pairs of the ideals considered are orthogonal and which are not. Furthermore we include Mycielski's ideal P_2 in our discussion

Directed Ramsey number for trees

In this paper, we study Ramsey-type problems for directed graphs. We first consider the $k$-colour oriented Ramsey number of $H$, denoted by $\overrightarrow{R}(H,k)$, which is the least $n$ for which every $k$-edge-coloured tournament on $n$ vertices contains a monochromatic copy of $H$. We prove that $\overrightarrow{R}(T,k) \le c_k|T|^k$ for any oriented tree $T$. This is a generalisation of a similar result for directed paths by Chv\'atal and by Gy\'arf\'as and Lehel, and answers a question of Yuster. In general, it is tight up to a constant factor. We also consider the $k$-colour directed Ramsey number $\overleftrightarrow{R}(H,k)$ of $H$, which is defined as above, but, instead of colouring tournaments, we colour the complete directed graph of order $n$. Here we show that $\overleftrightarrow{R}(T,k) \le c_k|T|^{k-1}$ for any oriented tree $T$, which is again tight up to a constant factor, and it generalises a result by Williamson and by Gy\'arf\'as and Lehel who determined the $2$-colour directed Ramsey number of directed paths.Comment: 27 pages, 14 figure

Dense subsets of products of finite trees

We prove a "uniform" version of the finite density Halpern-L\"{a}uchli Theorem. Specifically, we say that a tree $T$ is homogeneous if it is uniquely rooted and there is an integer $b\geq 2$, called the branching number of $T$, such that every $t\in T$ has exactly $b$ immediate successors. We show the following. For every integer $d\geq 1$, every $b_1,...,b_d\in\mathbb{N}$ with $b_i\geq 2$ for all $i\in\{1,...,d\}$, every integer k\meg 1 and every real $0<\epsilon\leq 1$ there exists an integer $N$ with the following property. If $(T_1,...,T_d)$ are homogeneous trees such that the branching number of $T_i$ is $b_i$ for all $i\in\{1,...,d\}$, $L$ is a finite subset of $\mathbb{N}$ of cardinality at least $N$ and $D$ is a subset of the level product of $(T_1,...,T_d)$ satisfying $$|D\cap \big(T_1(n)\times ...\times T_d(n)\big)| \geq \epsilon |T_1(n)\times ...\times T_d(n)|$$ for every $n\in L$, then there exist strong subtrees $(S_1,...,S_d)$ of $(T_1,...,T_d)$ of height $k$ and with common level set such that the level product of $(S_1,...,S_d)$ is contained in $D$. The least integer $N$ with this property will be denoted by $UDHL(b_1,...,b_d|k,\epsilon)$. The main point is that the result is independent of the position of the finite set $L$. The proof is based on a density increment strategy and gives explicit upper bounds for the numbers $UDHL(b_1,...,b_d|k,\epsilon)$.Comment: 36 pages, no figures; International Mathematics Research Notices, to appea

Induced Ramsey-type theorems

We present a unified approach to proving Ramsey-type theorems for graphs with a forbidden induced subgraph which can be used to extend and improve the earlier results of Rodl, Erdos-Hajnal, Promel-Rodl, Nikiforov, Chung-Graham, and Luczak-Rodl. The proofs are based on a simple lemma (generalizing one by Graham, Rodl, and Rucinski) that can be used as a replacement for Szemeredi's regularity lemma, thereby giving much better bounds. The same approach can be also used to show that pseudo-random graphs have strong induced Ramsey properties. This leads to explicit constructions for upper bounds on various induced Ramsey numbers.Comment: 30 page

Dimension and cut vertices: an application of Ramsey theory

Motivated by quite recent research involving the relationship between the dimension of a poset and graph-theoretic properties of its cover graph, we show that for every $d\geq 1$, if $P$ is a poset and the dimension of a subposet $B$ of $P$ is at most $d$ whenever the cover graph of $B$ is a block of the cover graph of $P$, then the dimension of $P$ is at most $d+2$. We also construct examples which show that this inequality is best possible. We consider the proof of the upper bound to be fairly elegant and relatively compact. However, we know of no simple proof for the lower bound, and our argument requires a powerful tool known as the Product Ramsey Theorem. As a consequence, our constructions involve posets of enormous size.Comment: Final published version with updated reference