Abstract
We study backbone colorings, a variation on classical vertex colorings: Given a graph G=(V,E) and a spanning subgraph H (the backbone) of G, a backbone coloring for G and H is a proper vertex coloring V →{ 1,2,... } in which the colors assigned to adjacent vertices in H differ by at least two. We concentrate on the cases where the backbone is either a spanning tree or a spanning path.
For tree backbones of G, the number of colors needed for a backbone coloring of G can roughly differ by a multiplicative factor of at most 2 from the chromatic number χ(G); for path backbones this factor is roughly \(\frac{3}{2}\). In the special case of split graphs G, the difference from χ(G) is at most an additive constant 2 or 1, for tree backbones and path backbones, respectively. The computational complexity of the problem ‘Given a graph G, a spanning tree T of G, and an integer l, is there a backbone coloring for G and T with at most l colors?’ jumps from polynomial to NP-complete between l = 4 (easy for all spanning trees) and l = 5 (difficult even for spanning paths).
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Broersma, H., Fomin, F.V., Golovach, P.A., Woeginger, G.J. (2003). Backbone Colorings for Networks. In: Bodlaender, H.L. (eds) Graph-Theoretic Concepts in Computer Science. WG 2003. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 2880. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-39890-5_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-39890-5_12
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