Ars Combinatoria

ISSN 0381-7032 (print), 2817-5204 (online)

Ars Combinatoria is the oldest Canadian journal of combinatorics, established in 1976, dedicated to advancing combinatorial mathematics through the publication of high-quality, peer-reviewed research papers. Over the decades, it has built a strong international reputation and continues to serve as a leading platform for significant contributions to the field.
Open Access:  The journal follows the Diamond Open Access model—completely free for both authors and readers, with no article processing charges (APCs)
Publication Frequency: From 2024 onward, Ars Combinatoria publishes four issues annually—in March, June, September, and December.
Scope: Publishes research in all areas of combinatorics, including graph theory, design theory, enumeration, algebraic combinatorics, combinatorial optimization and related fields.
Indexing & Abstracting:  Indexed in MathSciNet, Zentralblatt MATH, and EBSCO, ensuring wide visibility and scholarly reach.
Rapid Publication: Submissions are processed efficiently, with accepted papers published promptly in the next available issue.
Print & Online Editions: Issues are available in both print and online formats to serve a broad readership.

Bart De Bruyn1
1 Ghent University, Department of Mathematics, Krijgslaan 281 (S22), B-9000 Gent, Belgium,
Abstract:

A two-character set is a set of points of a finite projective space that has two intersection numbers with respect to hyperplanes. Two-character sets are related to strongly regular graphs and two-weight codes. In the literature, there are plenty of constructions for (non-trivial) two-character sets by considering suitable subsets of quadrics and Hermitian varieties. Such constructions exist for the quadrics \(Q^{+}(2n-1,4) \subseteq PG(2n-1,q)\), \(Q^{-}(2n+1,4) \subseteq PG(2n+1,q)\) and the Hermitian varieties \(H(2n-1,q^{2}) \subseteq PG(2n-1,q^{2})\), \(H(2n,q^{2}) \subseteq PG(2n,q^{2})\). In this note, we show that every two-character set of \(PG(2n,q)\) that is contained in a given nonsingular parabolic quadric \(Q(2n,q) \subseteq PG(2n,q)\) is a subspace of \(PG(2n,q)\). This offers some explanation for the absence of the parabolic quadrics in the above-mentioned constructions.

Jishe Feng1
1DEPARTMENT OF MATHEMATICS, LONGDONG UNIVERSITY, QINGYANG, GANSU, 745000, CHINA
Abstract:

Using the companion matrices, we get more identities and Hessenberg matrices about Fibonacci and Tribonacci numbers.
By Fibonacci and Tribonacci numbers we can evaluate the determinants and permanents of some special Hessenberg matrices.

Bo Wang1, JinHao Luo1, BiWu Fang1
1School of Electrical Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072,China
Abstract:

Let \(G\) be a graph with vertex set \(V(G)\) and edge set \(E(G)\). A function \(f: E(G) \rightarrow \{-1, 1\}\) is said to be a signed star dominating function of \(G\) if \(\sum_{e \in E_G(v)} f(e) \geq 1\) for every \(v \in V(G)\), where \(E_G(v) = \{uv \in E(G) | u \in V(G)\}\). The minimum of the values of \(\sum_{e \in E(G)} f(e)\), taken over all signed dominating functions \(f\) on \(G\), is called the signed star domination number of \(G\) and is denoted by \(\gamma_{SS}(G)\). In this paper, we prove that \(frac{n}{2}\leq \gamma_{SS}(T) \leq n-1\) for every tree \(T\) of order \(n\), and characterize all trees on \(n\) vertices with signed star domination number \(\frac{n}{2}\), \(\frac{n+1}{2}\), \(n-1\), or \(n-3\).

H. Kutuch1, F. Nuriyeva2, O. Ugurlu3
1DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER ENGINEERING, KARABUK UNIVERSITY, KARABUK, TURKEY
2DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE, Dokuz EyYLUv UNIVERSITY, IZMIR, TURKEY, INSTITUTE OF CONTROL SISTEMS OF ANAS, Baku, AZERBAIJAN
3DEPARTMENT OF MATHEMATICS, EGE UNIVERSITY, IZMIR, TURKEY
Abstract:

The concept of rainbow connection was introduced by Chartrand et al. in 2008. The rainbow connection number, \(rc(G)\), of a connected graph \(G = (V, E)\) is the minimum number of colors needed to color the edges of \(E\), so that each pair of vertices in \(V\) is connected by at least one path in which no two edges are assigned the same color. The rainbow vertex-connection number, \(rvc(G)\), is the vertex version of this problem. In this paper, we introduce mixed integer programming models for both versions of the problem. We show the validity of the proposed models and test their efficiency using a nonlinear programming solver.

Wuyang Sun1
1Center for Discrete Mathematics, Fuzhou University, Fuzhou, Fujian 350108, China
Abstract:

A graph of order \(n\) is \(p\)-factor-critical, where \(p\) is an integer with the same parity as \(n\), if the removal of any set of \(p\) vertices results in a graph with a perfect matching. It is well known that a connected vertex-transitive graph is \(1\)-factor-critical if it has odd order and is \(2\)-factor-critical or elementary bipartite if it has even order. In this paper, we show that a connected non-bipartite vertex-transitive graph \(G\) with degree \(k \geq 6\) is \(p\)-factor-critical, where \(p\) is a positive integer less than \(k\) with the same parity as its order, if its girth is not less than the bigger one between \(6\) and \( \frac{k(p-1)+8}{2(k-2)}\).

Hailong Hou1, Rui Gu1
1School of Mathematics and Statistics, Henan University of Science and Technology, Luoyang, 471023, P.R. China
Abstract:

In this paper, the completely regular endomorphisms of a split graph are investigated. We give necessary and sufficient conditions the completely regular endomorphisms of a split graph form a monoid.

M. Goyal1, A.K. Agarwal1
1Center for Advanced Study in Mathematics Panjab University Chandigarh-160014, India
Abstract:

In this paper, we interpret a generalized basic series as the generating function of two different combinatorial objects, viz., a restricted \(n\)-colour partition function, which we call a two-colour partition function, and a weighted lattice path function. This leads to infinitely many combinatorial identities. Our main result has the potential of yielding many Rogers-Ramanujan-MacMahon type combinatorial identities. This is illustrated by an example.

Rao Li1
1Dept. of mathematical sciences University of South Carolina at Aiken Aiken, SC 29801
Abstract:

Let \(u\) and \(v\) be two vertices in a graph \(G\). We say vertex \(u\) dominates vertex \(v\) if \(N(v) \subseteq N(u) \cup \{u\}\). If \(u\) dominates \(v\) or \(v\) dominates \(u\), then \(u\) and \(v\) are comparable. The Dilworth number of a graph \(G\), denoted \(\text{Dil}(G)\), is the largest number of pairwise incomparable vertices in the graph \(G\). A graph \(G\) is called \(\{H_1, H_2, \ldots, H_k\}\)-free if \(G\) contains no induced subgraph isomorphic to any \(H_i\), \(1 \leq i \leq k\). A graph \(G\) is called an \(L_1\)-graph if, for each triple of vertices \(u\), \(v\), and \(w\) with \(d(u,v) = 2\) and \(w \in N(u) \cap N(v)\), \(d(u)+d(v) \geq |N(u) \cup N(v) \cup N(w)| – 1\). Let \(G\) be a \(k\) (\(k \geq 2\))-connected \(L_2\)-graph. If \(G\) is \(\{K_{1,5}, K_{1,5+e}\}\)-free and \(\text{Dil}(G) \leq 2k-1\), then \(G\) is Hamiltonian or \(G \in \mathcal{F}\), where \(K_{1,5}+e\) is a graph obtained by joining a pair of nonadjacent vertices in \(K_{s,s}\) and \(\mathcal{F} = \{G : K_{p,p-1} \subseteq G \subseteq K_{p} \vee (p+1)K_1, 2 \leq p \leq 3\}\), where \(\vee\) denotes the join operation of two graphs.

Min-Hui Liu1, Gui-Xian Tian1, Shu-Yu Cui2
1 College of Mathematics, Physics end Information Engineering, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua, Zhejiang, 321004, P.R. China
2Xingzhi College, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua, Zhejiang, 321004, P.R. China
Abstract:

For a simple digraph \(D\) with \(n\) vertices, the energy of \(D\) is defined as \(E(D) = \sum_{i=1}^{n} |\Re(z_i)|\), where \(z_1, z_2, \ldots, z_n\) are the eigenvalues of \(D\). This paper first gives an improved lower bound on the spectral radius of \(D\), which is used to obtain some upper bounds for the energy \(E(D)\). These results improve and generalize some known results on upper bounds of the energy of digraphs.

C. Jayasekaran1
1Department of Mathematics, Pioneer Kumaraswamy College Nagercoil — 629 003, India.
Abstract:

A vertex \(v \in V(G)\) is said to be a self vertex switching of \(G\) if \(G\) is isomorphic to \(G^v\), where \(G^v\) is the graph obtained from \(G\) by deleting all edges of \(G\) incident to \(v\) and adding all edges incident to \(v\) which are not in \(G\). The set of all self vertex switchings of \(G\) is denoted by \({SS_1}(G)\) and its cardinality by \(ss_1(G)\). In [6], the number \(ss_1(G)\) is calculated for the graphs cycle, path, regular graph, wheel, Euler graph, complete graph, and complete bipartite graphs. In this paper, for a vertex \(v\) of a graph \(G\), the graph \(G^v\) is characterized for tree, star, and forest with a given number of components. Using this, we characterize trees and forests, each with a self vertex switching.