Equi-Toughness Partitions of Graphs

Let \( G = (V, E) \) be a simple graph. Let \( S \) be a subset of \( V(G) \). The toughness value of \( S \), denoted by \( T_S \), is defined as \( \frac{|S|}{\omega(G – S)} \), where \( \omega(G – S) \) denotes the number of components in \( G – S \). If \( S = V \), then \( \omega(G – S) \) is taken to be \( 1 \) and hence \( T_{V(G)} = |V(G)| \). A partition of \( V(G) \) into subsets \( V_1, V_2, \ldots, V_t \) such that \( T_{V_i} \), \( 1 \leq i \leq t \), is a constant is called an equi-toughness partitio of \( G \). The maximum cardinality of such a partition is called the equi-toughness partition number of \( G \) and is denoted by \( ET(G) \). The existence of \( ET \)-partition is guaranteed. In this paper, a study of this new parameter is initiated.