On Connected Colourings of Graphs

Amir Daneshgar1, Hossein Hajiabolhassan2, Navid Hamedazimi3
1Department of Mathematical Sciences Sharif University of Technology P.O. Box 11365-9415, Tehran, Iran
2 Department of Mathematics Shahid Beheshti University P.O, Box 19834, Tehran, Iran
3Department of Mathematical Sciences Sharif University of Technology P.O. Box 11365-9415, Tehran, iran

Abstract

In this paper, first we introduce the concept of a \({connected}\) graph homomorphism as a homomorphism for which the inverse image of any edge is either empty or a connected graph, and then we concentrate on chromatically connected (resp. chromatically disconnected) graphs such as \(G\) for which any \(\chi(G)\)-colouring is a connected (resp. disconnected) homomorphism to \(K_{\chi(G)}\).

In this regard, we consider the relationships of the new concept to some other notions as uniquely-colourability. Also, we specify some classes of chromatically disconnected graphs such as Kneser graphs \(KG(m,n)\) for which \(m\) is sufficiently larger than \(n\), and the line graphs of non-complete class II graphs.

Moreover, we prove that the existence problem for connected homomorphisms to any fixed complete graph is an NP-complete problem.