Graph structure of commuting functions

TL;DR

This paper investigates the structure of graphs representing functions that commute with a given function, providing a detailed classification and enumeration for finite and infinite sets, with implications for understanding functional symmetries.

Contribution

It offers a comprehensive description of the graph structure of commuting functions and reduces the problem to graph homomorphisms, including enumeration results for finite sets.

Findings

Characterization of functional graphs of commuting functions

Enumeration of functions commuting with a given function on finite sets

Generalization of results to arbitrary sets with additional graph components

Abstract

The problem of finding graph structure of functions commuting with a given function in terms of their functional graphs is considered. Structure of functional graphs of commuting functions is described. The problem is reduced to describing graph homomorphisms of weakly connected components of functional graphs. Four subcases with finite sets are considered: permutations commuting with permutation, permutations commuting with a function, functions commuting with a permutation and functions commuting with a function. For finite sets the number of functions commuting with a given one and functions with extremal properties are found. Results for finite sets are generalized to the case of arbitrary sets where there are additional types of functional graph components.