MH 1301 Discrete Mathematics

Assignment 08

Question 1

Draw and determine whether each of these graphs is strongly connected and if not,
whether it is weakly connected.

1. G = (V, E) with V = {a, b, c, d, e}, and directed edges

E = {(b, a), (b, c), (b, e), (e, a), (d, b), (c, d)}.
2. G = (V, E) with V = {a, b, c, d, e}, and directed edges
E = {(a, d), (a, e), (b, a), (b, c), (d, b), (d, c), (e, b), (e, d)}.
3. G = (V, E) with V = {a, b, c, d, e, f, g}, and directed edges
E = {(a, c), (a, g), (g, d), (d, c), (e, b), (b, f ), (f, e)}.

Question 2

The degree sequence of a graph G = (V, E) is the sequence of length n = |V | that

contains deg(v) for all v ∈ V . Usually it is sorted non-decreasingly.

1. State the degree sequence of the following graphs:

Graph 1 Graph 2

2. Prove that in every simple graph G = (V, E) there are two vertices that have
the same degree.
3. Prove that two graphs that do not have the same degree sequence cannot be
isomorphic.

1
Question 3

If a graph G is connected and has no simple path with a length greater than k, prove
that every two simple paths in G of length k have at least one vertex in common.

Question 4
1. Does this graph have an Euler circuit? Find one if there is one.

a b c d

i h g e f

2. Is it true that by adding edges to a simple graph G = (V, E) (without introduc-

ing multiple edges between any pair of vertices) one can always create a graph
that has an Euler circuit? Justify the answer.

Question 5 [Hard]

Given a simple graph G with n vertices and m edges. If G has exactly k connected
components, prove that
(n − k)(n − k + 1)
n−k ≤m≤ .
2

ssume the number of vertices in each component Ci is xi , where x1 + · · · + xk = n,

and xi are positive integers for all i.

First we show n − k ≤ m. To show this, we first prove that a connected graph G

with x vertices always has at least x − 1 edges. We start from an arbitrary vertex
v1 ∈ G. Since the graph is connected, there is an edge, say {v1 , v2 }, connecting v1

2
to G − {v1 }. Then there is an edge, say {∗, v3 }, connecting v1 , v2 to G − {v1 , v2 }.
Repeat this process until we have all x vertices included, and we have found x − 1
different edges along the process.

Having this claim, it is now straightforward to see that if the graphP

G has k connected
components, we have m ≥ (x1 − 1) + (x2 − 1) + · · · + (xk − 1) = i xi − k = n − k.

Next we show m ≤ (n−k)(n−k+1)

2
. For each connected component Ci with xi vertices,
the number of edges inside is at most xi (x2i −1) . Thus
X xi (xi − 1) 1X 2 1X 1X 2 n
m= = xi − xi = x − .
i
2 2 i 2 i 2 i i 2

Now we find the maximum value of i x2i . If there are two elements xi and xj that
P
are both strictly greater than 1, assume without loss of generality that xi ≤ xj . Then
consider x0i = xi − 1 and x0j = xj + 1, we have x0i 2 + xP02 2
j = (xi − 1) + (xj + 1) =
2

x2i + x2j + 2 + 2(xj − xi ) > x2i + x2j . This means when i x2i is maximized, at most
one xi is strictly greater than 1, and the rest must all be 1. Thus

1X 2 n (n − k + 1)2 + k − 1 n (n − k)(n − k + 1)
m= xi − ≤ − = .
2 i 2 2 2 2