MCA 520: Graph Theory

Instructor
Neelima Gupta
ngupta@cs.du.ac.in

Table of Contents

Directed Graphs

Simple Digraph
May contain one loop at each vertex.
Distance: we say that a vertex y is
at a distance d from a vertex x, if d is
the length of a shortest path from x
to y.

Motivation
Finite State Machine
For Example: a bulb controlled by two
switches often called three-way
switch.

Prediction Graphs
Functional Graphs

Underlying Graph
Weekly and Strongly Connected
Components.

 Subgraph, Isomorphism,
decomposition and Union are same
as that in undirected graphs
Incidence and Adjacency Matrices

Kernel

Theorem: Richardson
Every graph having no odd cycle contains a
kernel.
Proof: First prove for strongly connected digraphs D. Let y be any vertex in D. Let S be the
set of all vertices at even distance from y.
Show that there is no edge between the vertices in
Sleft as exercise.
Let x be in V \ S. Then x is at odd distance say d_1
from y. Since D is strongly connected there is a path
from x to y. Then the length of this path must be odd
for else we have an odd walk and hence an odd cycle.
Let x be the first vertex after x on this path. Then x
must be at even distance from y for if there exists a
(shorter) path of odd length from y to x, then again
we get an odd cycley to x to y..since x to y was
odd, x to y is even and thus y to x to y is odd.

An example to show that this is not

true if there is an odd cycle.

Proof continued by induction

Let n(D) =1 , single vertex graph, this itself is a kernel.
n(D) > 1, IH: true for a graph with < n(D) number of
vertices. Well prove it is true for n(D). If D is strongly
connected, we have already proved. So let D is not
strongly connected. Then D contains a strongly
connected component that has no outgoing edge. For
eg. Consider D that is a simple directed path: v1 -> v2
-> v3 -> v4. Then D has 4 SCC, each consisting of a
singleton and {v4} has no out going edge.
Since D is SCC, it has a kernel say S. Remove S and its
predecessors from the graph. Let D be the remaining
graph. By IH, D has a kernel say S.
Claim: S union S is a kernel for D

Vertex Degrees
In-deg, Out-deg.
In-neighborhood/predecessor set
Out-neighborhood/successor set
Degree-Sum Result: Sum of
indegrees = Sum of Outdegrees =
number of edges

Degree Sequence
Is a list of degree pairs (d+ (vi) , d- (vi)).
Proposition: A list of pairs of non-negative integers
is realizable as degree pairs of a digraph iff i d+
(vi) = i d- (vi)
This is true when multiple edges are allowed
Proof: let m = sum. Consider m points and label d +
(vi) points with label I and d- (vi) points with j. For
each point receiving label i and j put an edge from
I to j. Note that the resulting di-graph may contain
loops and muti-edges.so not a simple di-graph

Characterization of DS for simple

graphs (recall loops are allowed)
Split of a digraph:
A constructive algorithm similar to
the one for undirected graphs can be
given to test whether a list of pairs
of non-negative integers is realizable
as degree pairs of a digraph or not.
The algorithm uses split of a
digraphassignment.

Eulerian Di-graphs
Definitions of Trail, Walk, Circuit/Cycle
remain the same with directions on them.
A di-graph is Eulerian if it has an Eulerian
Cycle.
Lemma: If G is a di-graph with d + (G) > 1
(or d- (G) > 1 ) , then it contains a cycle.
A digraph G is Eulerian iff d + (v) = d- (v)
for all v and the underlying graph has at
most one non-trivial component.

Orientations and
Tournaments
2n^2 simple di-graphs with n vertices n 2
ordered pairs including loops, each is present
or absent..(0,1) choices
Orientation: for each edge in a simple
undirected graph G (no loops), choose the
direction .three choices (0,+1,-1)so 3 nC2
Tournament: Orientation of a complete
simple simple graphno loops, two choices
(+1, -1) so 2nC2

Representing n-teams league match

by an orientation of Kn
Let (u,v) be an edge if u wins.
Score(u) = number of matches u
wins = outdeg(u).
Thus out-degree sequence is also
called score sequence in a
tournament.
Indegree can be determined from
outdegree (how?)

How to define the winner?

Suppose we define winner to be the
team that has not lost to any other
team..there may be no winner, we
may have a cycle.
Def2: that has won against maximum
number of teams.

King of a tournament
Claim: A team(/vertex) with maximum score (/outdegree) beats every other team either directly or by
a path of length 2.
Definition: In a di-graph, a king is a vertex from
which every vertex is reachable by a path of length
at most 2.
Theorem: Every tournament has a king.
Proof: here well essentially prove our claim.
Note:There may be several vertices with maximum
out-degree i.e. maximum score and there may still
be no clear winner.
Worst is that all the vertices may have same outdegree.
The only thing we can claim is that there is at least
one winner.