We introduce a two-player game where the goal is to illuminate all edges of a graph. At each step the first player, called Illuminator, taps a vertex. The second player, called Adversary, reveals the edges incident with that vertex (consistent with the edges incident with the already tapped vertices). Illuminator tries to minimize the taps needed, and the value of the game is the number of taps needed with optimal play. We provide bounds on the value in trees and general graphs. In particular, we show that the value for the path on \( n \) vertices is \( \frac{2}{3} n + O(1) \), and there is a constant \( \varepsilon > 0 \) such that for every caterpillar on \( n \) vertices, the value is at most \( (1 – \varepsilon) n + 1 \).

Let \(G\) be a group, and let \(c\in\mathbb{Z}^+\cup\{\infty\}\). We let \(\sigma_c(G)\) be the maximal size of a subset \(X\) of \(G\) such that, for any distinct \(x_1,x_2\in X\), the group \(\langle x_1,x_2\rangle\) is not \(c\)-nilpotent; similarly we let \(\Sigma_c(G)\) be the smallest number of \(c\)-nilpotent subgroups of \(G\) whose union is equal to \(G\). In this note we study \(D_{2k}\), the dihedral group of order \(2k\). We calculate \(\sigma_c(D_{2k})\) and \(\Sigma_c(D_{2k})\), and we show that these two numbers coincide for any given \(c\) and \(k\).

Let \(p > 2\) be prime and \(r \in \{1,2, \ldots, p-1\}\). Denote by \(c_{p}(n)\) the number of \(p\)-regular partitions of \(n\) in which parts can occur not more than three times. We prove the following: If \(8r + 1\) is a quadratic non-residue modulo \(p\), \(c_{p}(pn + r) \equiv 0 \pmod{2}\) for all nonnegative integers \(n\).

Let \( G=(V,E) \) be a simple connected graph with vertex set \( G \) and edge set \( E \). The harmonic index of graph \( G \) is the value \( H(G)=\sum_{uv\in E(G)} \frac{2}{d_u+d_v} \), where \( d_x \) refers to the degree of \( x \). We obtain an upper bound for the harmonic index of trees in terms of order and the total domination number, and we characterize the extremal trees for this bound.

A \((p, g)\)-graph \(G\) is Euclidean if there exists a bijection \(f: V \to \{1, 2, \ldots, p\}\) such that for any induced \(C_3\)-subgraph \(\{v_1, v_2, v_3\}\) in \(G\) with \(f(v_1) < f(v_2) < f(v_3)\), we have that \(f(v_1) + f(v_2) > f(v_3)\). The Euclidean Deficiency of a graph \(G\) is the smallest integer \(k\) such that \(G \cup N_k\) is Euclidean. We study the Euclidean Deficiency of one-point union and one-edge union of complete graphs.

The dominating set of a graph \(G\) is a set of vertices \(D\) such that for every \(v \in V(G)\) either \(v \in D\) or \(v\) is adjacent to a vertex in \(D\). The domination number, denoted \(\gamma(G)\), is the minimum number of vertices in a dominating set. In 1998, Haynes and Slater [1] introduced paired-domination. Building on paired-domination, we introduce 3-path domination. We define a 3-path dominating set of \(G\) to be \(D = \{ Q_1,Q_2,\dots , Q_k\, |\:Q_i \text{ is a 3-path}\}\) such that the vertex set \(V(D) = V(Q_1) \cup V(Q_2) \cup \dots \cup V(Q_k)\) is a dominating set. We define the 3-path domination number, denoted by \(\gamma_{P_3}(G)\), to be the minimum number of 3-paths needed to dominate \(G\). We show that the 3-path domination problem is NP-complete. We also prove bounds on \(\gamma_{P_3}(G)\) and improve those bounds for particular families of graphs such as Harary graphs, Hamiltonian graphs, and subclasses of trees. In general, we prove \(\gamma_{P_3}(G) \leq \frac{n}{3}\).

Two colorings have been introduced recently where an unrestricted coloring \(c\) assigns nonempty subsets of \([k]=\{1,\ldots,k\}\) to the edges of a (connected) graph \(G\) and gives rise to a vertex-distinguishing vertex coloring by means of set operations. If each vertex color is obtained from the union of the incident edge colors, then \(c\) is referred to as a strong royal coloring. If each vertex color is obtained from the intersection of the incident edge colors, then \(c\) is referred to as a strong regal coloring. The minimum values of \(k\) for which a graph \(G\) has such colorings are referred to as the strong royal index of \(G\) and the strong regal index of \(G\) respectively. If the induced vertex coloring is neighbor distinguishing, then we refer to such edge colorings as royal and regal colorings. The royal chromatic number of a graph involves minimizing the number of vertex colors in an induced vertex coloring obtained from a royal coloring. In this paper, we provide new results related to these two coloring concepts and establish a connection between the corresponding chromatic parameters. In addition, we establish the royal chromatic number for paths and cycles.

A ranking on a graph \(G\) is a function \(f: V(G) \rightarrow \left\{1, 2, \ldots, k \right\}\) with the following restriction: if \(f(u)=f(v)\) for any \(u, v \in V(G)\), then on every \(uv\) path in \(G\), there exists a vertex \(w\) with \(f(w) > f(u)\). The optimality of a ranking is conventionally measured in terms of the \(l_{\infty}\) norm of the sequence of labels produced by the ranking. In \cite{jacob2017lp} we compared this conventional notion of optimality with the \(l_p\) norm of the sequence of labels in the ranking for any \(p \in [0,\infty)\), showing that for any non-negative integer \(c\) and any non-negative real number \(p\), we can find a graph such that the sets of \(l_p\)-optimal and \(l_{\infty}\)-optimal rankings are disjoint. In this paper we identify some graphs whose set of \(l_p\)-optimal rankings and set of \(l_{\infty}\)-optimal rankings overlap. In particular, we establish that for paths and cycles, if \(p>0\) then \(l_p\) optimality implies \(l_{\infty}\) optimality but not the other way around, while for any complete multipartite graph, \(l_p\) optimality and \(l_{\infty}\) optimality are equivalent.

We use a representation for the spanning tree where a parent function maps non-root vertices to vertices. Two spanning trees are defined to be adjacent if their function representations differ at exactly one vertex. Given a graph \(G\), we show that the graph \(H\) with all spanning trees of \(G\) as vertices and any two vertices being adjacent if and only if their parent functions differ at exactly one vertex is connected.

A \((0,1)\)-labeling of a set is said to be friendly if the number of elements of the set labeled 0 and the number labeled 1 differ by at most 1. Let \(g\) be a labeling of the edge set of a graph that is induced by a labeling \(f\) of the vertex set. If both \(g\) and \(f\) are friendly then \(g\) is said to be a cordial labeling of the graph. We extend this concept to directed graphs and investigate the cordiality of directed graphs. We show that all directed paths and all directed cycles are cordial. We also discuss the cordiality of oriented trees and other digraphs.