Digraph redicolouring

TL;DR

This paper investigates the computational complexity and structural properties of digraph colourings, proving PSPACE-completeness for recolouring, establishing conditions for $k$-mixing, and proposing conjectures on diameter bounds and degree conditions.

Contribution

It introduces new complexity results for digraph recolouring, generalizes $k$-mixing conditions, and formulates conjectures on diameter bounds and degree thresholds in digraph colourings.

Findings

Recolouring digraphs is PSPACE-complete even for simple cases.

Every digraph is $k$-mixing for $k extgreater{}= ext{minimum degree}+2$.

Connectedness and diameter bounds are established for specific classes of oriented graphs.

Abstract

Given two $k$-dicolourings of a digraph $D$, we prove that it is PSPACE-complete to decide whether we can transform one into the other by recolouring one vertex at each step while maintaining a dicolouring at any step even for $k=2$ and for digraphs with maximum degree $5$ or oriented planar graphs with maximum degree $6$. A digraph is said to be $k$-mixing if there exists a transformation between any pair of $k$-colourings. We show that every digraph $D$ is $k$-mixing for all $k\geq \delta^*_{\min}(D)+2$, generalizing a result due to Dyer et al. We also prove that every oriented graph $\vec{G}$ is $k$-mixing for all $k\geq \delta^*_{\max}(\vec{G}) +1$ and for all $k\geq \delta^*_{\rm avg}(\vec{G})+1$. We conjecture that, for every digraph $D$, the dicolouring graph of $D$ on $k\geq \delta_{\min}^*(D)+2$ colours has diameter at most $O(|V(D)|^2)$ and give some evidences. We first prove that the dicolouring graph of any digraph $D$ on $k\geq 2\delta_{\min}^*(D) + 2$ colours has linear diameter, extending a result from Bousquet and Perarnau. We also prove that the conjecture is true when $k\geq \frac{3}{2}(\delta_{\min}^*(D)+1)$. Restricted to the special case of oriented graphs, we prove that the dicolouring graph of any subcubic oriented graph on $k\geq 2$ colours is connected and has diameter at most $2n$. We conjecture that every non $2$-mixing oriented graph has maximum average degree at least $4$, and we provide some support for this conjecture by proving it on the special case of $2$-freezable oriented graphs. More generally, we show that every $k$-freezable oriented graph on $n$ vertices must contain at least $kn + k(k-2)$ arcs, and we give a family of $k$-freezable oriented graphs that reach this bound. In the general case, we prove as a partial result that every non $2$-mixing oriented graph has maximum average degree at least $\frac{7}{2}$.