Overfullness of critical class 2 graphs with a small core degree

Let $G$ be a simple graph, and let $n$, $Δ(G)$ and $χ' (G)$ be the order, the maximum degree and the chromatic index of $G$, respectively. We call $G$ overfull if $|E(G)|/\lfloor n/2\rfloor > Δ(G)$, and critical if $χ'(H) < χ'(G)$ for every proper subgraph $H$ of $G$. Clearly, if $G$ is overfull then $χ'(G) = Δ(G)+1$. The core of $G$, denoted by $G_Δ$, is the subgraph of $G$ induced by all its maximum degree vertices. Hilton and Zhao conjectured that for any critical class 2 graph $G$ with $Δ(G) \ge 4$, if the maximum degree of $G_Δ$ is at most two, then $G$ is overfull, which in turn gives $Δ(G) > n/2 +1$. We show that for any critical class 2 graph $G$, if the minimum degree of $G_Δ$ is at most two and $Δ(G) > n/2 +1$, then $G$ is overfull.

No reviews yet.

No comments yet.