Planar Graphs of Odd-Girth at Least $9$ are Homomorphic to the Petersen Graph

  • Authors:
  • Z. Dvořák;R. Škrekovski;T. Valla

  • Affiliations:
  • rakdver@kam.mff.cuni.cz;valla@kam.mff.cuni.cz;bluesky2high@yahoo.com

  • Venue:
  • SIAM Journal on Discrete Mathematics
  • Year:
  • 2008

Quantified Score

Hi-index 0.00

Visualization

Abstract

Let $G$ be a graph and let $c: V(G)\to\binom{1,\ldots,5}{2}$ be an assignment of $2$-element subsets of the set $1,\ldots,5$ to the vertices of $G$ such that for every edge $vw$, the sets $c(v)$ and $c(w)$ are disjoint. We call such an assignment a $(5,2)$-coloring. A graph is (5,2)-colorable if and only if it has a homomorphism to the Petersen graph. The odd-girth of a graph $G$ is the length of the shortest odd cycle in $G$ ($\infty$ if $G$ is bipartite). We prove that every planar graph of odd-girth at least $9$ is $(5,2)$-colorable, and thus it is homomorphic to the Petersen graph. Also, this implies that such graphs have a fractional chromatic number at most $5\over2$. As a special case, this result holds for planar graphs of girth at least $8$.