31 research outputs found
On a greedy algorithm to construct universal cycles for permutations
A universal cycle for permutations of length n is a cyclic word or permutation, any factor of which is order-isomorphic to exactly one permutation of length n, and containing all permutations of length n as factors. It is well known that universal cycles for permutations of length n exist. However, all known ways to construct such cycles are rather complicated. For example, in the original paper establishing the existence of the universal cycles, constructing such a cycle involves finding an Eulerian cycle in a certain graph and then dealing with partially ordered sets. In this paper, we offer a simple way to generate a universal cycle for permutations of length n, which is based on applying a greedy algorithm to a permutation of length n - 1. We prove that this approach gives a unique universal cycle In for permutations, and we study properties of I n
An explicit universal cycle for the (n-1)-permutations of an n-set
We show how to construct an explicit Hamilton cycle in the directed Cayley
graph Cay({\sigma_n, sigma_{n-1}} : \mathbb{S}_n), where \sigma_k = (1 2 >...
k). The existence of such cycles was shown by Jackson (Discrete Mathematics,
149 (1996) 123-129) but the proof only shows that a certain directed graph is
Eulerian, and Knuth (Volume 4 Fascicle 2, Generating All Tuples and
Permutations (2005)) asks for an explicit construction. We show that a simple
recursion describes our Hamilton cycle and that the cycle can be generated by
an iterative algorithm that uses O(n) space. Moreover, the algorithm produces
each successive edge of the cycle in constant time; such algorithms are said to
be loopless
Universal Lyndon Words
A word over an alphabet is a Lyndon word if there exists an
order defined on for which is lexicographically smaller than all
of its conjugates (other than itself). We introduce and study \emph{universal
Lyndon words}, which are words over an -letter alphabet that have length
and such that all the conjugates are Lyndon words. We show that universal
Lyndon words exist for every and exhibit combinatorial and structural
properties of these words. We then define particular prefix codes, which we
call Hamiltonian lex-codes, and show that every Hamiltonian lex-code is in
bijection with the set of the shortest unrepeated prefixes of the conjugates of
a universal Lyndon word. This allows us to give an algorithm for constructing
all the universal Lyndon words.Comment: To appear in the proceedings of MFCS 201
Sparse Kneser graphs are Hamiltonian
For integers and , the Kneser graph is the
graph whose vertices are the -element subsets of and whose
edges connect pairs of subsets that are disjoint. The Kneser graphs of the form
are also known as the odd graphs. We settle an old problem due to
Meredith, Lloyd, and Biggs from the 1970s, proving that for every ,
the odd graph has a Hamilton cycle. This and a known conditional
result due to Johnson imply that all Kneser graphs of the form
with and have a Hamilton cycle. We also prove that
has at least distinct Hamilton cycles for .
Our proofs are based on a reduction of the Hamiltonicity problem in the odd
graph to the problem of finding a spanning tree in a suitably defined
hypergraph on Dyck words
Euler tours in hypergraphs
We show that a quasirandom -uniform hypergraph has a tight Euler tour
subject to the necessary condition that divides all vertex degrees. The
case when is complete confirms a conjecture of Chung, Diaconis and Graham
from 1989 on the existence of universal cycles for the -subsets of an
-set.Comment: version accepted for publication in Combinatoric