A constructive characterisation of circuits in the simple $(2,1)$-sparse matroid

TL;DR

This paper provides a constructive characterization of (2,1)-circuits in simple graphs, using operations like 1-extension, X-replacement, and summation moves to build all such circuits systematically.

Contribution

It introduces a new constructive method to characterize (2,1)-circuits, advancing understanding of their structure and potential applications in graph realization problems.

Findings

Provides a complete constructive characterization of (2,1)-circuits.

Uses operations like 1-extension and X-replacement for construction.

Facilitates understanding of graph realizations on surfaces.

Abstract

A simple graph $G=(V,E)$ is a $(2,1)$-circuit if $|E|=2|V|$ and $|E(H)|\leq 2|V(H)|-1$ for every proper subgraph $H$ of $G$. Motivated, in part, by ongoing work to understand unique realisations of graphs on surfaces, we derive a constructive characterisation of $(2,1)$-circuits. The characterisation uses the well known 1-extension and $X$-replacement operations as well as several summation moves to glue together $(2,1)$-circuits over small cutsets.