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28 votes
8 answers
6k views

Representability of finite metric spaces

There have been a couple questions recently regarding metric spaces, which got me thinking a bit about representation theorems for finite metric spaces. Suppose $X$ is a set equipped with a metric $d$...
Matt Noonan's user avatar
  • 4,014
22 votes
2 answers
900 views

Is every 1-million-connected graph rigid in 3D?

It is an old result that every $6$-connected graph is rigid in $\mathbb{R}^2$: Lovász, László, and Yechiam Yemini. "On generic rigidity in the plane." SIAM Journal on Algebraic Discrete ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
18 votes
2 answers
700 views

Can all unit-distance graphs have their vertices at algebraic integers?

A graph $G$ is described as a unit-distance graph if there exists a function $f:G \rightarrow \mathbb{C}$ such that for every edge $(u,v) \in E(G)$, we have $|f(u) - f(v)| = 1$. Obviously, we can ...
Adam P. Goucher's user avatar
18 votes
2 answers
1k views

Are hyperbolic spaces actually better for embedding trees than Euclidean spaces?

There is a folklore in the empirical computer-science literature that, given a tree $(X,d)$, one can find a bi-Lipschitz embedding into a hyperbolic space $\mathbb{H}^n$ and that $n$ is "much ...
Carlos_Petterson's user avatar
18 votes
2 answers
573 views

Can the graph of a symmetric polytope have more symmetries than the polytope itself?

I consider convex polytopes $P\subseteq\Bbb R^d$ (convex hull of finitely many points) which are arc-transitive, i.e. where the automorphism group acts transitively on the 1-flags (incident vertex-...
M. Winter's user avatar
  • 13.6k
16 votes
3 answers
2k views

Are infinite planar graphs still 4-colorable?

Imagine you have a finite number of "sites" $S$ in the positive quadrant of the integer lattice $\mathbb{Z}^2$, and from each site $s \in S$, one connects $s$ to every lattice point to which it has a ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
15 votes
1 answer
1k views

Ricci curvature : beyond heat-like flows

Let me give you some context first: just a few days ago I found some intriguing references to Ricci flows in the setting of directed graphs. There are at least two versions of Ricci curvature in the ...
Mirco A. Mannucci's user avatar
13 votes
0 answers
751 views

$\epsilon$-nets with respect to the cut norm

The cut norm $||A||\_C$ of a real matrix $A = (a_{i,j}) \in \mathcal{R}^{n\times n}$ is the maximum over all $I \subseteq [n], J \subseteq [n]$ of the quantity $\left|\sum_{i \in I, j \in J}a_{i,j}\...
Aaron's user avatar
  • 794
12 votes
5 answers
2k views

Extensions of the Koebe–Andreev–Thurston theorem to sphere packing?

The Koebe–Andreev–Thurston theorem states that any planar graph can be represented "in such a way that its vertices correspond to disjoint disks, which touch if and only if the corresponding vertices ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
11 votes
2 answers
669 views

Which curves and surfaces are realizable by linkages? references?

Ok, so I try to formulate rigorously the question in the title, for which I am asking for references. My definitions may be flawed, so feel free to adjust/correct them! I care about dimensions 2 and 3 ...
Mircea's user avatar
  • 2,041
11 votes
2 answers
3k views

Algorithm for embedding a graph with metric constraints

Suppose I have a graph $G$ with vertex set $V$, edge set $E \subseteq {V \choose 2}$, a poistive integer $d$, and a weight function $w:E \to \mathbb{R}^{+}$. Is there a nice algorithmic way to decide ...
Matthew Kahle's user avatar
11 votes
1 answer
369 views

The number of relevant scales for a finite metric space

For an $n$-element metric space $X=\{x_1,\dots,x_n\}$ with metric $d$ we introduce an array containing $\frac{n(n-1)}2$ numbers $d(x_i,x_j)$, $i<j$. We assume that all distances are at least $1$. ...
Mikhail Ostrovskii's user avatar
11 votes
3 answers
2k views

Could a perfect squared square be split into two perfect squared squares?

This is a geometric puzzle though it might conceivably also define a special class of Pythagorean triples. A perfect squared square PSS is a square (as a plane figure) partitioned into smaller ...
Mirko's user avatar
  • 1,375
11 votes
1 answer
506 views

"minimal" embedding of bipartite graphs on a sphere

Here is an easy to pose problem I've encountered (but haven't been able to solve or disprove): Let (V,E) be a bipartite graph with the following property – the girth of the graph (i.e. the length of ...
Izhar Oppenheim's user avatar
10 votes
4 answers
1k views

An introductory text on expanders

I am looking for a book that covers expander graphs rigorously. Preferably a book aimed at beginners.
mahdi meisami's user avatar
10 votes
2 answers
579 views

Is every knot unavoidable in the embeddings of some graph?

Is it the case that, for any given knot $K$, there exists some graph $G$ whose every embedding into $\mathbb{R}^3$ (or into $\mathbb{S}^3$) contains a cycle that realizes $K$? I know the famous ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
10 votes
2 answers
496 views

Graph metric approximating Euclidean metric

I've been reading Wolfram's recent articles about graph/mesh/grid structures as an analogy for physical space, and it seems to me that there will be a problem getting the notion of distance to work ...
Black Carrot's user avatar
10 votes
3 answers
460 views

Do triple-linked graphs exist?

Lets say that a finite simple graph $G$ is (intrinsically) fully triple-linked if for each embedding of $G$ into $\Bbb R^3$ we can find three disjoint cycles $C_1,C_2,C_3\subset G$ whose embeddings ...
M. Winter's user avatar
  • 13.6k
10 votes
2 answers
677 views

Is every metric space quasi-isometric to a graph?

I've proved that if $(X, d)$ is a geodesic metric space then there exists a graph which is quasi-isometric to $X$...during this proof I've precisely used the fact that given two point in $X$ there ...
Anubhav Mukherjee's user avatar
10 votes
2 answers
255 views

Is the face lattice of the cube a polytope graph?

The face lattice of a convex polytope $P\subset\Bbb R^d$ is the partially ordered set whose elements are the faces of $P$ ordered by inclusion. We can turn it into a graph by considering its Hasse ...
M. Winter's user avatar
  • 13.6k
10 votes
3 answers
500 views

Given the skeleton of an inscribed polytope. If I move the vertices so that no edge increases in length, can the circumradius still get larger?

Let $P\subset \Bbb R^n$ be an inscribed convex polytope, that is, all its vertices are on a common sphere of radius $r$. Let $G$ be the edge-graph of $P$. For convenience, assume $V(G)=\{1,\dotsc,s\}$....
M. Winter's user avatar
  • 13.6k
9 votes
3 answers
1k views

Does there exist a notion of discrete riemannian metric on graph?

I would like to know if there is any notion of a discrete Riemannian metric on graphs. C. Mercat has worked on discrete Riemann Surfaces, but that's not exactly what I am working on. To be more ...
Laurent.C's user avatar
9 votes
4 answers
371 views

Diameter of random segment intersection graph?

I have an even number of points $n$ randomly distributed (uniformly) in a disk. Then the points are randomly connected to form $n/2$ segments, a perfect matching. Finally, I form the intersection ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
9 votes
3 answers
605 views

Separating points in the plane II

Let A be a set of $2m$ points on the plane so that no open set of diameter $2$ has more than m of them. Define $A+A+...+A$ ($k$ times) to be the multiset of $k$-sums from $A$. That is, we consider all ...
TOM's user avatar
  • 2,288
9 votes
0 answers
370 views

Embedding a graph into Euclidean space

I want to find a map $v\mapsto \tilde v$ from the vertex set of a connected infinite graph $\Gamma$ to a Euclidean space that meets the following two conditions: there is $\varepsilon>0$ such that ...
Anton Petrunin's user avatar
8 votes
4 answers
1k views

Shortest Path in Plane

I thought about the following problem: Given a polygonal subdivision of the euclidian plane where each of the polygons has a speed associated with it, and given two points s,t, I'm interested in the ...
user695652's user avatar
8 votes
2 answers
2k views

Embedding points in 2D based on distance estimates?

Suppose we have a collection of exactly $N$ points (say $N=1000$), with each point belonging to 2-dimensional Euclidean space $\mathbb{R}^2$, but we don't know the coordinates of the points. Suppose ...
Douglas S. Stones's user avatar
8 votes
1 answer
567 views

Joining the $2^k$ points of $\{0,1\}^k$ with the shortest tree

Let $k$ be a given positive integer, and then consider the unit hypercube $\{0, 1\}^k \subset \mathbb{R}^k$ (i.e., a $k$-dimensional "cube" in the well-known Euclidean space). We need to ...
Marco Ripà's user avatar
  • 1,451
8 votes
2 answers
484 views

Preferred embedding of finite metric spaces in riemaniann manifolds of given dimension

In search for a Machian formulation of mechanics I find the following problem. In Machian mechanics absolute space does not exists, and the only real entities are the relative distances between the ...
Bruno Galvan's user avatar
8 votes
1 answer
721 views

Is the Cheeger constant of an induced subgraph of a cube at most 1?

It is known that the Cheeger constant of a hypercube graph $Q_n$ is exactly $1$, regardless of its dimension $n$. Is $1$ also an upper bound on the Cheeger constant of nontrivial induced connected ...
psd's user avatar
  • 266
8 votes
2 answers
621 views

Generalization of Hamiltonian cycles to "Hamiltonian spheres"

One possible generalization of a Hamiltonian cycle in a triangulated plane graph is what could be called a Hamiltonian sphere: a collection of triangles within a simplicial complex in $\mathbb{R}^3$ ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
7 votes
3 answers
474 views

Polygonal paths and polygons with prescribed set of vertices

Let $A$ be a finite set of points in the plane. How can we determine if there is a simple open polygonal path (i.e. without intersections), whose vertices are exactly $A$, with no straight angles ...
Algirdas Rugys's user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
289 views

A centralised website for computational attempts in graph theory and metric geometry?

The set of questions below stems from this question. 1) does a website exist that contains (at least links to) code and data files, with the aim to centralise computational results in graph theory ...
Archie's user avatar
  • 883
7 votes
1 answer
283 views

Are two quasi-isometric, isomorphic on large enough balls, transitive graphs isomorphic?

Take two transitive graphs $X,Y$ (potentially directed and edge-labelled, e.g. Cayley graphs). Assume $X,Y$ are quasi-isometric with constant $K$, i.e. there exists a function $f:VX \to VY$ ($VX,\,VY$ ...
user148575's user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
171 views

Metric TSP with integer edge cost

Given a metric TSP with integer edge cost upper-bounded by a constant $C_{\max}$, can we find an poly-time algorithm solving this TSP instance?
lchen's user avatar
  • 367
7 votes
1 answer
757 views

Length of nearest neighbor path in travel salesman problem

Given $n$ nodes uniformly distributed in $[0,1]^2$, consider the nearest neighbor algorithm to solve traveling salesman problem, i.e., each time I select the nearest neighbor not visited so far as the ...
lchen's user avatar
  • 367
7 votes
1 answer
439 views

Integral straight-line embeddings of planar graphs

Wikipedia says (in the article on Fáry's theorem), "Heiko Harborth raised the question of whether every planar graph has a straight line representation in which all edge lengths are integers. The ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
153 views

Above/below directed graph on cells of arrangement of lines

This question concerns the structure of a directed graph built on the cells of an arrangement of lines. My basic question is whether this graph has been studied before, perhaps in another guise. I ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
665 views

What is the Cheeger constant of a cubical subset of the cubic lattice?

The Cheeger constant of a finite graph measures the "bottleneckedness" of the graph, and is defined as: $$h(G) := \min\Bigg\lbrace\frac{|\partial A|}{|A|} \Bigg| A\subset V, 0<|A|\leq \frac{|V|}{2}...
Henry Segerman's user avatar
7 votes
0 answers
102 views

Median spaces as retracts of hypercubes

It is known (See e.g. here, Theorem 2.1) that median graphs are retracts of hypercubes. Question: Is it also known that median metric spaces are retract of some $l¹$ product of unit intervals? By ...
user148575's user avatar
6 votes
4 answers
2k views

Delaunay triangulations and convex hulls

This is a reference request. I have the impression that those who work in computational geometry are accustomed to the following. You have some locally finite set of sites in $\mathbb{R}^n$ and you ...
Michael Hardy's user avatar
6 votes
5 answers
1k views

Generate random graphs that satisfy the triangle inequality

I would like to generate random graphs that might be geometric graphs in some (unknown) dimension. So I would like every triangle in the graph to satisfy the triangle inequality on its (random) edge ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar
6 votes
2 answers
404 views

Estimating shortest paths in planar drawings of graphs

Consider a drawing (in $\mathbb{R}^2$) of a planar graph. (The drawing is given, contrarily to the common setup in graph theory where we are seeking to build a drawing with specific properties.) For ...
Denis Gorodkov's user avatar
6 votes
3 answers
1k views

Average squared distance vs diameter in vertex-transitive graphs

Let $X=(V,E)$ be a finite, connected graph on $n$ vertices, endowed with its graph metric $d$. The average squared distance of $X$ is $avg(d^2)=\frac{1}{n(n-1)}\sum_{x,y\in V,x\neq y} d(x,y)^2$; it ...
Alain Valette's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
483 views

Separating pairs of points in R^n

Let $A$ be a set of $2k$ points in $\mathbb{R}^n$ such that no open set in $\mathbb{R}^n$ of diameter $2$ contains more than $k$ of these points. What is the largest possible distance $r_n>0$ one ...
TOM's user avatar
  • 2,288
6 votes
2 answers
1k views

Minimum spanning tree of a weighted graph

I have a connected graph $G=(V,E)$ in $n$ vertices. The edge weights are non-negative and form a metric space, thus for vertices $u,v,w \in V$ , such that $(u,v), (v,w), (w,u)\in E$ we have $r(u,w) \...
MAKCL's user avatar
  • 89
6 votes
3 answers
982 views

Boolean network as a gauge field

Consider a set of N binary-state nodes at "time" t, each of which is a (boolean) transition function of two nodes in the set, evaluated at time t-1. Thus there are N of these boolean functions of two ...
Chris Weed's user avatar
6 votes
2 answers
268 views

Counting valid coordinates

We are given a matrix $D = (d(i,j))_{1 \leq i,j \leq n}$ such that $d(x,z) \leq d(x,y) + d(y,z)$ for each $1 \leq x,y,z \leq n$. It is also known that $d(x,y) \in \mathbb{N}$ (In this question $0 \in \...
real's user avatar
  • 323
6 votes
1 answer
257 views

Expected doubling constant of a random Erdős–Rényi graph

Consider the $G(n,p)$ random graph model where $n$ is a ``large'' positive integer and $p\in (0,1)$. We may equip every realized random graph $G$ with its shortest path distance, making it into a (...
ABIM's user avatar
  • 5,405
6 votes
1 answer
260 views

Arbitrary-dimensional expanders?

Rephrasing expansion (slightly). Consider the following slightly tweaked version of the usual definition of a (spectral) expander graph. (We write a weighted graph as $(V,\beta)$, where the weight $\...
H A Helfgott's user avatar
  • 20.2k