For a graph $G$, let $h(G)$ be the minimum cardinality of a vertex set meeting every maximum independent set of $G$. We establish two complementary reduction principles for the Bollob\'as--Erd\H{o}s--Tuza conjecture: the conjecture for arbitrary graphs is equivalent to its restriction to regular graphs of any fixed positive linear degree, and, within every hereditary graph class, a uniform sublinear bound is equivalent to a sublinear bound on graphs of every fixed positive linear vertex connectivity. We prove the sharp general estimate \[ h(G)\le \left\lfloor\frac{|V(G)|}{2\alpha(G)+\delta(G)-|V(G)|}\right\rfloor \] whenever the denominator is positive, with equality for balanced complete multipartite graphs. Consequently, every $3$-colorable graph of order $n$ with $\kappa(G)\ge\rho n$ and $\rho>1/3$ has a hitting set of size at most $\lfloor(\rho-1/3)^{-1}\rfloor$; direct use of a $3$-coloring improves this to $6$ when $\kappa(G)>4n/9$ and to the sharp bound $3$ when $\kappa(G)>n/2$. For dense regular graphs with independence ratio greater than $1/4$, we obtain a logarithmic bound, while constructions with linear degree and linear independence number show that $h(G)=\Omega(\sqrt n)$ can still occur. We also prove a logarithmic bound for near-regular $3$-colorable graphs and exhibit a critical family at connectivity $n/3$ that explains the limitations of the degree-surplus and degree-ratio methods.
The local clique cover number $lcc(G)$ is the minimum valency of an edge-clique cover of $G$. We prove the conjectured inequality $lcc(G)+\chi(G)\le |V(G)|+1$ for every finite simple graph. The proof gives an independent set improvement of an endpoint-cover estimate and applies the resulting construction to an induced four-vertex path. We further prove that the cover can be chosen so that every nonuniversal vertex has valency at most $|V(G)|-\chi(G)$. Consequently, every graph attaining equality has a universal vertex. The stronger statement follows by reducing a counterexample of minimum order to a prime double-critical graph and refining the induced path extension. We also show that an induced matching of size $m\ge2$ yields $lcc(G)+\chi(G)\le |V(G)|+3-m$, which improves the general bound when $m\ge3$, and determine the restrictions imposed by equality on deletion of an induced $2K_2$.
For a graph $G$ of order $n$, let $\mathcal E(G)$ denote its adjacency energy and let $\alpha(G)$ denote its independence number. A recent theorem of Kumar and Pragada states that $$\mathcal E(G)\ge 2\bigl(n-\alpha(G)\bigr).$$ We determine all graphs attaining equality. More precisely, equality holds if and only if every connected component of $G$ is an isolated vertex, a balanced complete multipartite graph, or a graph obtained by taking the disjoint union of $K_{a,\ldots,a}$ and $K_{b,\ldots,b}$, with the same number $r\ge3$ of parts, and then completely joining corresponding parts.
Let $G$ be a graph with chromatic number $\chi(G)$, clique number $\omega(G)$ and zero forcing number $Z(G)$. We establish new lower bounds on $Z(G)$ in terms of induced triangle-free subgraphs. In particular, we show that if a graph $G$ contains an induced triangle-free subgraph $H$ with minimum degree $\delta(H) \ge 3$, then $Z(G)\ge\delta(H)+1$. As consequences, we prove that every triangle-free graph satisfies $\chi(G)\le\max\{3,Z(G)\}$ and obtain an application to planar graphs. Moreover, we prove that $\chi(G)\le \frac{Z(G)}{2}+2$ for every triangle-free graph.
Let $G$ be a graph with minimum degree $\delta(G)\ge|V(G)|/2$. Can we color the edges of $G$ with red and blue so that every pair of non-adjacent vertices is connected by a path consisting of exactly one red edge and one blue edge? We provide an affirmative answer to this question for a class of graphs that are ``close''to a complete balanced bipartite graph or the disjoint union of two cliques of the same order. Surprisingly, our methods extend to a much broader class of graphs with minimum degree slightly above $|V(G)|/2$. Furthermore, we answer an asymptotic version of this question in full, proving that every graph $G$ satisfying $\delta(G)\ge(|V(G)|-1)/2$ has a $2$-edge-coloring such that almost all pairs of vertices are connected by a rainbow path. In addition, we propose a number of related open problems.
For a graph $G$, let $s^+(G)$ and $s^-(G)$ denote the sums of the squares of its positive and negative adjacency eigenvalues. We determine all equality cases in the conjecture of Elphick, Farber, Goldberg, and Wocjan that every connected graph $G$ on $n$ vertices satisfies \[ \min \{s^+(G),s^-(G)\}\ge n-1. \] Namely, equality for $s^+$ holds exactly for trees, whereas equality for $s^-$ holds exactly for trees and complete graphs. The proof combines the $P_3$-removal lemma in the no-cut-vertex case with a detailed equality analysis of the underlying doubly nonnegative matrix inequality. Every block is forced to be complete, and a minimal-counterexample argument gives an exact rank-one decomposition of the folded matrix $M^c$. The resulting non-edge vanishings, together with $AX=XA$, rule out an interface between a bridge and a nontrivial block.
A vertex-coloring of a graph is centered if every connected subgraph has a vertex with a unique color. A vertex-coloring of a graph is linear if every path in the graph has a vertex with a unique color. Let $\chi_{\mathrm{cen}}(G)$ and $\chi_{\mathrm{lin}}(G)$ be the minimum number of colors in a centered (resp. linear) coloring of $G$. We present a family of graphs witnessing that if $f$ is a nondecreasing function such that $\chi_{\mathrm{cen}}(G) \leq f(\chi_{\mathrm{lin}}(G))$ for every graph $G$, then $f(k) = \Omega(k^2 / \log k)$. The construction was found by OpenAI's GPT-5.6 Sol Pro.
Jędrzej Hodor, P. Micek· 0 citations
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