TBI 02-tb-001 A Discrete Nodal Domain Theorem for Trees

02-tb-001


Abstract:
A Discrete Nodal Domain Theorem for Trees

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T. Biyikoglu

Let G be a connected graph with n vertices and let x=(x_1,...,x_n) be a real vector. A positive (negative) sign graph of the vector x is a maximal connected subgraph of G on vertices x_i>0 (x_i<0). For an eigenvalue of a generalized Laplacian of a tree: We character ize the maximal number of sign graphs of an eigenvector. We give an O(n^2) time algorithm to find an eigenvector with maximum number of sign graphs and we show that finding an eigenvector with minimum number of sign graphs is an NP-complete problem.

Keywords: discrete nodal domain theorem; eigenvectors of a matrix with non-positive off-diagonal elements; tree; graph Laplacian;



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