Extension on spectral extrema of gem-free graph with given size

TL;DR

This paper extends spectral extremal results for gem-free graphs, establishing new bounds on the spectral radius for graphs with a given size and characterizing the extremal graphs.

Contribution

It provides a new spectral bound for odd-sized gem-free graphs and identifies the unique extremal graph achieving this bound.

Findings

Spectral radius of certain gem-free graphs is bounded by that of a specific extremal graph.

Characterization of the extremal graph as $S_{(m+5)/2,2}^2$ for odd $m \\geq 23$.

Extension of previous results to a broader class of graphs with new extremal conditions.

Abstract

A graph $G$ is $F$-free if $G$ does not contain $F$ as a subgraph. Let $\mathcal{G}(m, F)$ denote the family of $F$-free graphs with $m$ edges and without isolated vertices. Let $S_{n,k}$ denote the graph obtained by joining every vertex of $K_{k}$ to $n-k$ isolated vertices and $S_{n,k}^{t}$ denote the graph obtained from $S_{n-t,k}$ by attaching $t$ pendant vertices to the maximal degree vertex of $S_{n-t,k}$, respectively. Denote by $H_{n}$ the fan graph obtain from $n-1$-vertex path plus a vertex adjacent to each vertex of the path. Particularly, the graph $H_{5}$ is also known as the gem. Zhang and Wang [Discrete Math. 347(2024)114171] and Yu, Li and Peng [arXiv: 2404. 03423] showed that every gem-free graph $G$ with $m$ edges satisfies $\rho(G)\leq \rho(S_{\frac{m+3}{2},2})$. In this paper, we show that if $G\in \mathcal{G}(m, H_{5})\setminus S_{\frac{m+3}{2},2}$ be a graph of odd size $m\geq23$, then $\rho(G)\leq \rho(S_{\frac{m+5}{2},2}^{2})$, and equality holds if and only if $G\cong S_{\frac{m+5}{2},2}^{2}$.