MATH 580 / CS 571

COMBINATORIAL MATHEMATICS, Fall 2004

Summary of Lectures

This page contains a summary of the lectures in this course for Fall 2004. It lists only the topics discussed in each lecture. The text provides extensive discussion and additional material, so no additional notes are provided here. The order and coverage of topics is (will be) similar to Fall 2003, so that can be used as a rough guide to upcoming material.

Lec 1, 8/25 Wed, Sec 1.1: Course overview, general principles of enumeration, counting of words & subsets, binomial theorem. (Leftover to Lec 2: multisets and compositions.)
Lec 2, 8/27 Fri, Sec 1.2: Lattice paths, basic identities, extended binomial coefficient, summing initial values of polynomials, identity for Delannoy numbers.
Lec 3, 8/30 Mon, Sec 1.3: Counting graphs and trees, multinomial coefficients (trees by degrees, Fermat's Little Theorem.
Lec 4, 9/1 Wed, Sec 1.3-2.1: Ballot problem, central binomial convolution, Catalan numbers, Cycle Lemma, Catalan bijections, Catalan recurrence.

Lec 5, 9/3 Fri, Sec 2.1-2: Recurrences (regions among lines, Fibonacci and 1,2-lists, derangements), recurrences in two variables (distribution problems, Delannoy numbers), characteristic equation method (through Fibonacci solution).
Lec 6, 9/8 Wed, Sec 2.2: Characteristic equation method (repeated roots, inhomogeneous), generating function method (linear constant coefficients, Catalan).
Lec 7, 9/10 Fri, Sec 2.3-3.1: substitution method (factorials, derangements, Stirling's approximation), generating functions (sum/product operations, multisets, compositions).

Lec 8, 9/13 Mon, Sec 3.1-2: generating functions (subsets, permutations by inversions, permutations by #cycles), manipulations (differentiation, evaluation at special values, shifting index, summing initial coefficients).
Lec 9, 9/15 Wed, Sec 3.2-3: Summation by convolutions, Snake Oil method, products of EGFs (words).
Lec 10, 9/17 Fri, Sec 3.3: Examples and applications of EGFs (flags on poles, restricted words, Stirling numbers, binomial inversion, derangements); the exponential formula (for graphs).
Lec 11, 9/20 Mon, Sec 3.4: The Exponential Formula (partitions, permutations, recurrence); Lagrange Inversion Formula (statement and application to trees); partitions of integers (generating functions and asymptotics).
Lec 12, 9/22 Wed, Sec 3.4-4.1: Partition arguments with Ferrers diagrams (conjugation, classes of triangles, Euler's Identity); inclusion-exclusion (basic formula and totient application).

Lec 13, 9/24 Fri, Sec 4.1: Inclusion-exclusion applications (Stirling numbers, derangements, identities), permutations with restricted positions (rook polynomials), OGF by number of properties, probleme des menages.
Lec 14, 9/27 Mon, Sec 4.1: Signed involutions (inclusion-exclusion formula, partitions into distinct odd parts, path systems in digraphs, application to disjoint-path systems of lattice paths and rhombus tilings).
Lec 15, 9/29 Wed, Sec 4.2: Examples for counting under symmetry, Lagrange's Theorem, Burnside's Lemma, cycle indices, symmetries of cube.
Lec 16, 10/1 Fri, Sec 4.2-3: Pattern inventory (Polya's Theorem), applications to isomorphism classes of graphs and to crowns. Young tableaux (brief presentation of Hook-length formula, RSK correspondence, and consequences of RSK correspondence).

Chapter 5, First Concepts for Graphs, for background reading
Lec 17, 10/4 Mon, Sec 6.1: Bipartite Matching (Hall's Theorem, Marriage Theorem, Birkhoff-von Neumann Theorem, Ore's min/max formula, Konig-Egervary Theorem, statement of Gallai's Theorem and Konig's Other Theorem).
Lec 18, 10/6 Wed, Sec 6.2: General Matching (Augmenting paths, Berge-Tutte Formula, Tutte's 1-Factor Theorem, application of Tutte's Theorem to regular graphs, Petersen's 2-Factor Theorem (via Eulerian circuit and Hall's Theorem), momentary mention of f-factors).

Lec 19, 10/8 Fri, Sec 7.1: (Vertex) connectivity definitions, cartesian product with K2, Harary graphs, edge-connectivity definitions, Whitney's Theorem, edge-connectivity for diameter 2 (Plesnik), brief mention of bonds and blocks.
Lec 20, 10/11 Mon, Sec 7.2: k-Connected Graphs (Independent x,y-paths, linkage and blocking sets, Pym's Theorem, Menger's Theorems (8 versions), Ford-Fulkerson CSDR, Expansion and Fan Lemmas, cycles through specified vertices).
Lec 21, 10/13 Wed, Sec 7.3: Hamiltonian cycles (necessary condition, Ore & Dirac conditions, closure, statement of Chvatal condition, Chvatal example).

Lec 22, 10/15 Fri, Sec 7.3-8.1: leftover spanning cycles (statement/example of Fan's Theorem, Chvatal-Erdos Theorem), vertex coloring (examples, easy bounds, behavior under join, greedy coloring, interval graphs, degree bounds, Minty's Theorem).
Lec 23, 10/18 Mon, Sec 8.1-2: Triangle-free graphs (Mycielski's construction), color-critical graphs (minimum degree, edge-connectivity), list coloring (examples and degree-choosability).
Lec 24, 10/20 Wed, Sec 8.2-4: List extension of Brooks' Theorem, edge-coloring (complete graphs, Class 1 vs 2, Petersen graph, bipartite graphs), perfect graphs (definition and comments only).

Lec 25, 10/22 Fri, Sec 8.3-9.1: Anderson-Goldberg generalization of Vizing's Theorem, planar graphs and their duals, cycles vs bonds, bipartite = dual Eulerian, Euler's Formula and edge bound.
Lec 26, 10/25 Mon, Sec 9.1-3: Kuratowski's Theorem (sketch of proof via convex embeddings), coloring of planar graphs (6CT, 5CT, Kempe), 5-list-coloring, Tait's Theorem.

Lec 27, 10/27 Wed, Sec 9.3-10.1: Grinberg's Theorem, applications of pigeonhole principle (divisible pairs, covering by bipartite graphs, domino tilings, monotone sublists, increasing trails).
Lec 28, 10/29 Fri, Sec 10.1: Permutation patterns (proof of Stanley-Wilf Conjecture), Ramsey's Theorem.
Lec 29, 11/1 Mon, Sec 10.2: Applications of Ramsey's Theorem (convex m-gons, table storage), Ramsey numbers.
Lec 30, 11/3 Wed, Sec 10.3-12.1: Graph Ramsey theory (tree vs complete graph) infinite Ramsey theory, Schur's Theorem, Van der Waerden's Theorem (statement and example), poset definitions and examples, Dilworth's Theorem

Lec 31, 11/5 Fri, Sec 12.1-2: Equivalence of Dilworth and Konig-Egervary Theorems, relation to Perfect Graph Theorem, graded posets, symmetric chain decompositions for subsets and products, bracketing decomposition.
Lec 32, 11/8 Mon, Sec 12.2-3: Application of bracketing to monotone Boolean functions, LYM Inequality and Sperner's Theorem, equivalence of LYM with regular covering and normalized matching
Lec 33, 11/10 Wed, Sec 12.3-14.1: LYM and symmetric unimodal rank-sizes => symmetric chain decomposition, existence arguments (Ramsey number, 2-colorability of k-uniform hypergraphs), pigeonhole property of expectation (linearity and indicator variables, Caro-Wei bound on independence number)

Lec 34, 11/12 Fri, Sec 14.1-2: Application of Caro-Wei to Turan's Theorem, Binet's Formula for Fibonacci numbers by conditional probability, deletion method (Ramsey numbers, dominating sets, brief sketch for large girth and chromatic number).
Lec 35, 11/15 Mon, Sec 14.2-3: Local Lemma (Ramsey numbers, list coloring), random graph models, almost-always properties, connectedness of the random graph.
Lec 36, 11/17 Wed, Sec 14.3: Markov's Inequality, diameter 2, threshold functions, second moment method, disappearance of isolated vertices.

Lec 37, 11/19 Fri, Sec 17.1: (second moment method for threshold for appearance of balanced graphs), Latin squares (orthogonal families, Moore-MacNeish construction),
Lec 38, 11/29 Mon, Sec 17.1: block designs (examples, constraints on parameters, symmetric designs) Hadamard matrices (restriction on order, relation to designs).
Lec 39, 12/1 Wed, Sec 17.1-2: Hadamard matrices (application to coding theory), projective planes (elementary properties, relation to designs and Latin squares).
Lec 40, 12/3 Fri, Sec 17.2: projective planes from fields, polarity graph, application to extremal problems (avoiding 4-cycles, diameter 2), difference sets and multipliers.

Lec 41, 12/6 Mon, Sec 18.1: Matroid examples and equivalence of definitions.
Lec 42, 12/8 Wed, Sec 18.1: Matroids: greedy algorithm, span function, duality.
Lec 43, 12/10 Fri, Sec 18.1-2: Matroid minors, Whitney's characterization of planar graphs by abstract duals, matroid intersection and its applications.