scholarly journals Crossing Numbers and Hard Erdős Problems in Discrete Geometry

1997 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 353-358 ◽  
Author(s):  
LÁSZLÓ A. SZÉKELY

We show that an old but not well-known lower bound for the crossing number of a graph yields short proofs for a number of bounds in discrete plane geometry which were considered hard before: the number of incidences among points and lines, the maximum number of unit distances among n points, the minimum number of distinct distances among n points.

Mathematics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 525
Author(s):  
Javier Rodrigo ◽  
Susana Merchán ◽  
Danilo Magistrali ◽  
Mariló López

In this paper, we improve the lower bound on the minimum number of  ≤k-edges in sets of n points in general position in the plane when k is close to n2. As a consequence, we improve the current best lower bound of the rectilinear crossing number of the complete graph Kn for some values of n.


2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (04) ◽  
pp. 2050019
Author(s):  
Yuanan Diao

For an unoriented link [Formula: see text], let [Formula: see text] be the ropelength of [Formula: see text]. It is known that in general [Formula: see text] is at least of the order [Formula: see text], and at most of the order [Formula: see text] where [Formula: see text] is the minimum crossing number of [Formula: see text]. Furthermore, it is known that there exist families of (infinitely many) links with the property [Formula: see text]. A long standing open conjecture states that if [Formula: see text] is alternating, then [Formula: see text] is at least of the order [Formula: see text]. In this paper, we show that the braid index of a link also gives a lower bound of its ropelength. More specifically, we show that there exists a constant [Formula: see text] such that [Formula: see text] for any [Formula: see text], where [Formula: see text] is the largest braid index among all braid indices corresponding to all possible orientation assignments of the components of [Formula: see text] (called the maximum braid index of [Formula: see text]). Consequently, [Formula: see text] for any link [Formula: see text] whose maximum braid index is proportional to its crossing number. In the case of alternating links, the maximum braid indices for many of them are proportional to their crossing numbers hence the above conjecture holds for these alternating links.


2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (04) ◽  
pp. 2050022
Author(s):  
Sarah Goodhill ◽  
Adam M. Lowrance ◽  
Valeria Munoz Gonzales ◽  
Jessica Rattray ◽  
Amelia Zeh

Using region crossing changes, we define a new invariant called the multi-region index of a knot. We prove that the multi-region index of a knot is bounded from above by twice the crossing number of the knot. In addition, we show that the minimum number of generators of the first homology of the double branched cover of [Formula: see text] over the knot is strictly less than the multi-region index. Our proof of this lower bound uses Goeritz matrices.


10.37236/9687 ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Surya Mathialagan

Given sets $\mathcal{P}, \mathcal{Q} \subseteq \mathbb{R}^2$ of sizes $m$ and $n$ respectively, we are interested in the number of distinct distances spanned by $\mathcal{P} \times \mathcal{Q}$. Let $D(m, n)$ denote the minimum number of distances determined by sets in $\mathbb{R}^2$ of sizes $m$ and $n$ respectively, where $m \leq n$. Elekes showed that $D(m, n) = O(\sqrt{mn})$ when $m \leqslant n^{1/3}$. For $m \geqslant n^{1/3}$, we have the upper bound $D(m, n) = O(n/\sqrt{\log n})$ as in the classical distinct distances problem.In this work, we show that Elekes' construction is tight by deriving the lower bound of $D(m, n) = \Omega(\sqrt{mn})$ when $m \leqslant n^{1/3}$. This is done by adapting Székely's crossing number argument. We also extend the Guth and Katz analysis for the classical distinct distances problem to show a lower bound of $D(m, n) = \Omega(\sqrt{mn}/\log n)$ when $m \geqslant n^{1/3}$.


2012 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 358-373 ◽  
Author(s):  
BORIS BUKH ◽  
ALFREDO HUBARD

We define a variant of the crossing number for an embedding of a graphGinto ℝ3, and prove a lower bound on it which almost implies the classical crossing lemma. We also give sharp bounds on the rectilinear space crossing numbers of pseudo-random graphs.


2016 ◽  
Vol 164 (1) ◽  
pp. 147-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
COLIN ADAMS ◽  
ORSOLA CAPOVILLA-SEARLE ◽  
JESSE FREEMAN ◽  
DANIEL IRVINE ◽  
SAMANTHA PETTI ◽  
...  

AbstractA multi-crossing (or n-crossing) is a singular point in a projection of a knot or link at which n strands cross so that each strand bisects the crossing. We generalise the classic result of Kauffman, Murasugi and Thistlethwaite relating the span of the bracket polynomial to the double-crossing number of a link, span〈K〉 ⩽ 4c2, to the n-crossing number. We find the following lower bound on the n-crossing number in terms of the span of the bracket polynomial for any n ⩾ 3: $$\text{span} \langle K \rangle \leq \left(\left\lfloor\frac{n^2}{2}\right\rfloor + 4n - 8\right) c_n(K).$$ We also explore n-crossing additivity under composition, and find that for n ⩾ 4 there are examples of knots K1 and K2 such that cn(K1#K2) = cn(K1) + cn(K2) − 1. Further, we present the the first extensive list of calculations of n-crossing numbers of knots. Finally, we explore the monotonicity of the sequence of n-crossings of a knot, which we call the crossing spectrum.


Symmetry ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (12) ◽  
pp. 2441
Author(s):  
Michal Staš

The crossing number of a graph G is the minimum number of edge crossings over all drawings of G in the plane. The main purpose of this paper is to determine the crossing numbers of the join products of six symmetric graphs on six vertices with paths and cycles on n vertices. The idea of configurations is generalized for the first time onto the family of subgraphs whose edges cross the edges of the considered graph at most once, and their lower bounds of necessary numbers of crossings are presented in the common symmetric table. Some proofs of the join products with cycles are done with the help of several well-known auxiliary statements, the idea of which is extended by a suitable classification of subgraphs that do not cross the edges of the examined graphs.


2021 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 95-112
Author(s):  
Michal Staš ◽  
Juraj Valiska

The crossing number \(\mathrm{cr}(G)\) of a graph \(G\) is the minimum number of edge crossings over all drawings of \(G\) in the plane. The main aim of the paper is to give the crossing number of the join product \(W_4+P_n\) and \(W_4+C_n\) for the wheel \(W_4\) on five vertices, where \(P_n\) and \(C_n\) are the path and the cycle on \(n\) vertices, respectively. Yue et al. conjectured that the crossing number of \(W_m+C_n\) is equal to \(Z(m+1)Z(n)+(Z(m)-1) \big \lfloor \frac{n}{2} \big \rfloor + n+ \big\lceil\frac{m}{2}\big\rceil +2\), for all \(m,n \geq 3\), and where the Zarankiewicz's number \(Z(n)=\big \lfloor \frac{n}{2} \big \rfloor \big \lfloor \frac{n-1}{2} \big \rfloor\) is defined for \(n\geq 1\). Recently, this conjecture was proved for \(W_3+C_n\) by Klešč. We establish the validity of this conjecture for \(W_4+C_n\) and we also offer a new conjecture for the crossing number of the join product \(W_m+P_n\) for \(m\geq 3\) and \(n\geq 2\).


10.37236/1834 ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Éva Czabarka ◽  
Ondrej Sýkora ◽  
László A. Székely ◽  
Imrich Vrťo

We extend a lower bound due to Shahrokhi, Sýkora, Székely and Vrťo for the outerplanar crossing number (in other terminologies also called convex, circular and one-page book crossing number) to a more general setting. In this setting we can show a better lower bound for the outerplanar crossing number of hypercubes than the best lower bound for the planar crossing number. We exhibit further sequences of graphs, whose outerplanar crossing number exceeds by a factor of $\log n$ the planar crossing number of the graph. We study the circular arrangement problem, as a lower bound for the linear arrangement problem, in a general fashion. We obtain new lower bounds for the circular arrangement problem. All the results depend on establishing good isoperimetric functions for certain classes of graphs. For several graph families new near-tight isoperimetric functions are established.


10.37236/7581 ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robin Anderson ◽  
Shuliang Bai ◽  
Fidel Barrera-Cruz ◽  
Éva Czabarka ◽  
Giordano Da Lozzo ◽  
...  

Tanglegrams are special graphs that consist of a pair of rooted binary trees with the same number of leaves, and a perfect matching between the two leaf-sets. These objects are of use in phylogenetics and are represented with straight-line drawings where the leaves of the two plane binary trees are on two parallel lines and only the matching edges can cross. The tangle crossing number of a tanglegram is the minimum number of crossings over all such drawings and is related to biologically relevant quantities, such as the number of times a parasite switched hosts.Our main results for tanglegrams which parallel known theorems for crossing numbers are as follows. The removal of a single matching edge in a tanglegram with $n$ leaves decreases the tangle crossing number by at most $n-3$, and this is sharp. Additionally, if $\gamma(n)$ is the maximum tangle crossing number of a tanglegram with $n$ leaves, we prove $\frac{1}{2}\binom{n}{2}(1-o(1))\le\gamma(n)<\frac{1}{2}\binom{n}{2}$. For an arbitrary tanglegram $T$, the tangle crossing number, $\mathrm{crt}(T)$, is NP-hard to compute (Fernau et al. 2005). We provide an algorithm which lower bounds $\mathrm{crt}(T)$ and runs in $O(n^4)$ time. To demonstrate the strength of the algorithm, simulations on tanglegrams chosen uniformly at random suggest that the tangle crossing number is at least $0.055n^2$ with high probabilty, which matches the result that the tangle crossing number is $\Theta(n^2)$ with high probability (Czabarka et al. 2017).


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