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Unit distance graph

In mathematics, particularly geometric graph theory, a unit distance graph is a graph formed from a collection of points in the Euclidean plane by connecting two points whenever the distance between them is exactly one. To distinguish these graphs from a broader definition that allows some non-adjacent pairs of vertices to be at distance one, they may also be called strict unit distance graphs or faithful unit distance graphs. As a hereditary family of graphs, they can be characterized by forbidden induced subgraphs. The unit distance graphs include the cactus graphs, the matchstick graphs and penny graphs, and the hypercube graphs. The generalized Petersen graphs are non-strict unit distance graphs.

A unit distance graph with 16 vertices and 40 edges

An unsolved problem of Paul Erdős asks how many edges a unit distance graph on vertices can have. The best known lower bound is slightly above linear in —far from the upper bound, proportional to . The number of colors required to color unit distance graphs is also unknown (the Hadwiger–Nelson problem): some unit distance graphs require five colors, and every unit distance graph can be colored with seven colors. For every algebraic number there is a unit distance graph with two vertices that must be that distance apart. According to the Beckman–Quarles theorem, the only plane transformations that preserve all unit distance graphs are the isometries.

It is possible to construct a unit distance graph efficiently, given its points. Finding all unit distances has applications in pattern matching, where it can be a first step in finding congruent copies of larger patterns. However, determining whether a given graph can be represented as a unit distance graph is NP-hard, and more specifically complete for the existential theory of the reals.

Definition Edit

 
The Petersen graph as a unit distance graph[1]
 
The Möbius–Kantor graph as a subgraph of a unit distance graph

The unit distance graph for a set of points in the plane is the undirected graph having those points as its vertices, with an edge between two vertices whenever their Euclidean distance is exactly one. An abstract graph is said to be a unit distance graph if it is possible to find distinct locations in the plane for its vertices, so that its edges have unit length and so that all non-adjacent pairs of vertices have non-unit distances. When this is possible, the abstract graph is isomorphic to the unit distance graph of the chosen locations. Alternatively, some sources use a broader definition, allowing non-adjacent pairs of vertices to be at unit distance. The resulting graphs are the subgraphs of the unit distance graphs (as defined here).[2] Where the terminology may be ambiguous, the graphs in which non-edges must be a non-unit distance apart may be called strict unit distance graphs[3] or faithful unit distance graphs.[2] The subgraphs of unit distance graphs are equivalently the graphs that can be drawn in the plane using only one edge length.[4] For brevity, this article refers to these as "non-strict unit distance graphs".

Unit distance graphs should not be confused with unit disk graphs, which connect pairs of points when their distance is less than or equal to one, and are frequently used to model wireless communication networks.[5]

Examples Edit

The complete graph on two vertices is a unit distance graph, as is the complete graph on three vertices (the triangle graph), but not the complete graph on four vertices.[3] Generalizing the triangle graph, every cycle graph is a unit distance graph, realized by a regular polygon.[4] Two finite unit distance graphs, connected at a single shared vertex, yield another unit distance graph, as one can be rotated with respect to the other to avoid undesired additional unit distances.[6] By thus connecting graphs, every finite tree or cactus graph may be realized as a unit distance graph.[7]

 
The hypercube graph   has 16 vertices and 32 unit distances
 
The Hamming graph   has 27 vertices and 81 unit distances

Any Cartesian product of unit distance graphs produces another unit distance graph; however, the same is not true for some other common graph products. For instance, the strong product of graphs, applied to any two non-empty graphs, produces complete subgraphs with four vertices, which are not unit distance graphs. The Cartesian products of path graphs form grid graphs of any dimension, the Cartesian products of the complete graph on two vertices are the hypercube graphs,[8] and the Cartesian products of triangle graphs are the Hamming graphs  .[9]

Other specific graphs that are unit distance graphs include the Petersen graph,[10] the Heawood graph,[11] the wheel graph   (the only wheel graph that is a unit distance graph),[3] and the Moser spindle and Golomb graph (small 4-chromatic unit distance graphs).[12] All generalized Petersen graphs, such as the Möbius–Kantor graph depicted, are non-strict unit distance graphs.[13]

Matchstick graphs are a special case of unit distance graphs, in which no edges cross. Every matchstick graph is a planar graph,[14] but some otherwise-planar unit distance graphs (such as the Moser spindle) have a crossing in every representation as a unit distance graph. Additionally, in the context of unit distance graphs, the term 'planar' should be used with care, as some authors use it to refer to the plane in which the unit distances are defined, rather than to a prohibition on crossings.[3] The penny graphs are an even more special case of unit distance and matchstick graphs, in which every non-adjacent pair of vertices are more than one unit apart.[14]

Properties Edit

Number of edges Edit

Unsolved problem in mathematics:

How many unit distances can be determined by a set of   points?

Paul Erdős (1946) posed the problem of estimating how many pairs of points in a set of   points could be at unit distance from each other. In graph-theoretic terms, the question asks how dense a unit distance graph can be, and Erdős's publication on this question was one of the first works in extremal graph theory.[15] The hypercube graphs and Hamming graphs provide a lower bound on the number of unit distances, proportional to   By considering points in a square grid with carefully chosen spacing, Erdős found an improved lower bound of the form

 
for a constant  , and offered $500 for a proof of whether the number of unit distances can also be bounded above by a function of this form.[16] The best known upper bound for this problem is
 
This bound can be viewed as counting incidences between points and unit circles, and is closely related to the crossing number inequality and to the Szemerédi–Trotter theorem on incidences between points and lines.[17]

For small values of   (up to 14, as of 2022), the exact maximum number of possible edges is known. For   these numbers of edges are:[18]

1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 12, 14, 18, 20, 23, 27, 30, 33, ... (sequence A186705 in the OEIS)

Forbidden subgraphs Edit

If a given graph   is not a non-strict unit distance graph, neither is any supergraph   of  . A similar idea works for strict unit distance graphs, but using the concept of an induced subgraph, a subgraph formed from all edges between the pairs of vertices in a given subset of vertices. If   is not a strict unit distance graph, then neither is any other   that has   as an induced subgraph. Because of these relations between whether a subgraph or its supergraph is a unit distance graph, it is possible to describe unit distance graphs by their forbidden subgraphs. These are the minimal graphs that are not unit distance graphs of the given type. They can be used to determine whether a given graph   is a unit distance graph, of either type.   is a non-strict unit distance graph, if and only if   is not a supergraph of a forbidden graph for the non-strict unit distance graphs.   is a strict unit distance graph, if and only if   is not an induced supergraph of a forbidden graph for the strict unit distance graphs.[8]

For both the non-strict and strict unit distance graphs, the forbidden graphs include both the complete graph   and the complete bipartite graph  . For  , wherever the vertices on the two-vertex side of this graph are placed, there are at most two positions at unit distance from them to place the other three vertices, so it is impossible to place all three vertices at distinct points.[8] These are the only two forbidden graphs for the non-strict unit distance graphs on up to five vertices; there are six forbidden graphs on up to seven vertices[6] and 74 on graphs up to nine vertices. Because gluing two unit distance graphs (or subgraphs thereof) at a vertex produce strict (respectively non-strict) unit distance graphs, every forbidden graph is a biconnected graph, one that cannot be formed by this gluing process.[19]

The wheel graph   can be realized as a strict unit distance graph with six of its vertices forming a unit regular hexagon and the seventh at the center of the hexagon. Removing one of the edges from the center vertex produces a subgraph that still has unit-length edges, but which is not a strict unit distance graph. The regular-hexagon placement of its vertices is the only one way (up to congruence) to place the vertices at distinct locations such that adjacent vertices are a unit distance apart, and this placement also puts the two endpoints of the missing edge at unit distance. Thus, it is a forbidden graph for the strict unit distance graphs,[20] but not one of the six forbidden graphs for the non-strict unit distance graphs. Other examples of graphs that are non-strict unit distance graphs but not strict unit distance graphs include the graph formed by removing an outer edge from  , and the six-vertex graph formed from a triangular prism by removing an edge from one of its triangles.[19]

Algebraic numbers and rigidity Edit

For every algebraic number  , it is possible to construct a unit distance graph   in which some pair of vertices are at distance   in all unit distance representations of  .[21] This result implies a finite version of the Beckman–Quarles theorem: for any two points   and   at distance   from each other, there exists a finite rigid unit distance graph containing   and   such that any transformation of the plane that preserves the unit distances in this graph also preserves the distance between   and  .[22] The full Beckman–Quarles theorem states that the only transformations of the Euclidean plane (or a higher-dimensional Euclidean space) that preserve unit distances are the isometries. Equivalently, for the infinite unit distance graph generated by all the points in the plane, all graph automorphisms preserve all of the distances in the plane, not just the unit distances.[23]

If   is an algebraic number of modulus 1 that is not a root of unity, then the integer combinations of powers of   form a finitely generated subgroup of the additive group of complex numbers whose unit distance graph has infinite degree. For instance,   can be chosen as one of the two complex roots of the polynomial  , producing an infinite-degree unit distance graph with four generators.[24]

Coloring Edit

Unsolved problem in mathematics:

What is the largest possible chromatic number of a unit distance graph?

The Hadwiger–Nelson problem concerns the chromatic number of unit distance graphs, and more specifically of the infinite unit distance graph formed from all points of the Euclidean plane. By the de Bruijn–Erdős theorem, which assumes the axiom of choice, this is equivalent to asking for the largest chromatic number of a finite unit distance graph. There exist unit distance graphs requiring five colors in any proper coloring,[25] and all unit distance graphs can be colored with at most seven colors.[26]

 
A seven-coloring of the infinite unit distance graph formed from all points of the plane, and the four-chromatic Moser spindle embedded as a unit distance graph

Answering another question of Paul Erdős, it is possible for triangle-free unit distance graphs to require four colors.[27]

Enumeration Edit

The number of strict unit distance graphs on   labeled vertices is at most[2]

 
as expressed using big O notation and little o notation.

Generalization to higher dimensions Edit

The definition of a unit distance graph may naturally be generalized to any higher-dimensional Euclidean space. In three dimensions, unit distance graphs of   points have at most   edges, where   is a very slowly growing function related to the inverse Ackermann function.[28] This result leads to a similar bound on the number of edges of three-dimensional relative neighborhood graphs.[29] In four or more dimensions, any complete bipartite graph is a unit distance graph, realized by placing the points on two perpendicular circles with a common center, so unit distance graphs can be dense graphs.[7] The enumeration formulas for unit distance graphs generalize to higher dimensions, and shows that in dimensions four or more the number of strict unit distance graphs is much larger than the number of subgraphs of unit distance graphs.[2]

Any finite graph may be embedded as a unit distance graph in a sufficiently high dimension. Some graphs may need very different dimensions for embeddings as non-strict unit distance graphs and as strict unit distance graphs. For instance the  -vertex crown graph may be embedded in four dimensions as a non-strict unit distance graph (that is, so that all its edges have unit length). However, it requires at least   dimensions to be embedded as a strict unit distance graph, so that its edges are the only unit-distance pairs.[30] The dimension needed to realize any given graph as a strict unit graph is at most twice its maximum degree.[31]

Computational complexity Edit

Constructing a unit distance graph from its points is an important step for other algorithms for finding congruent copies of some pattern in a larger point set. These algorithms use this construction to search for candidate positions where one of the distances in the pattern is present, and then use other methods to test the rest of the pattern for each candidate.[32] A method of Matoušek (1993) can be applied to this problem,[32] yielding an algorithm for finding a planar point set's unit distance graph in time   where   is the slowly growing iterated logarithm function.[33]

It is NP-hard—and more specifically, complete for the existential theory of the reals—to test whether a given graph is a (strict or non-strict) unit distance graph in the plane.[34] It is also NP-complete to determine whether a planar unit distance graph has a Hamiltonian cycle, even when the graph's vertices all have known integer coordinates.[35]

References Edit

Notes Edit

Sources Edit

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External links Edit

  • Venkatasubramanian, Suresh, "Problem 39: Distances among Point Sets in R2 and R3", The Open Problems Project
  • Weisstein, Eric W., "Unit-Distance Graph", MathWorld

unit, distance, graph, mathematics, particularly, geometric, graph, theory, unit, distance, graph, graph, formed, from, collection, points, euclidean, plane, connecting, points, whenever, distance, between, them, exactly, distinguish, these, graphs, from, broa. In mathematics particularly geometric graph theory a unit distance graph is a graph formed from a collection of points in the Euclidean plane by connecting two points whenever the distance between them is exactly one To distinguish these graphs from a broader definition that allows some non adjacent pairs of vertices to be at distance one they may also be called strict unit distance graphs or faithful unit distance graphs As a hereditary family of graphs they can be characterized by forbidden induced subgraphs The unit distance graphs include the cactus graphs the matchstick graphs and penny graphs and the hypercube graphs The generalized Petersen graphs are non strict unit distance graphs A unit distance graph with 16 vertices and 40 edgesAn unsolved problem of Paul Erdos asks how many edges a unit distance graph on n displaystyle n vertices can have The best known lower bound is slightly above linear in n displaystyle n far from the upper bound proportional to n 4 3 displaystyle n 4 3 The number of colors required to color unit distance graphs is also unknown the Hadwiger Nelson problem some unit distance graphs require five colors and every unit distance graph can be colored with seven colors For every algebraic number there is a unit distance graph with two vertices that must be that distance apart According to the Beckman Quarles theorem the only plane transformations that preserve all unit distance graphs are the isometries It is possible to construct a unit distance graph efficiently given its points Finding all unit distances has applications in pattern matching where it can be a first step in finding congruent copies of larger patterns However determining whether a given graph can be represented as a unit distance graph is NP hard and more specifically complete for the existential theory of the reals Contents 1 Definition 2 Examples 3 Properties 3 1 Number of edges 3 2 Forbidden subgraphs 3 3 Algebraic numbers and rigidity 3 4 Coloring 3 5 Enumeration 4 Generalization to higher dimensions 5 Computational complexity 6 References 6 1 Notes 6 2 Sources 7 External linksDefinition Edit nbsp The Petersen graph as a unit distance graph 1 nbsp The Mobius Kantor graph as a subgraph of a unit distance graph The unit distance graph for a set of points in the plane is the undirected graph having those points as its vertices with an edge between two vertices whenever their Euclidean distance is exactly one An abstract graph is said to be a unit distance graph if it is possible to find distinct locations in the plane for its vertices so that its edges have unit length and so that all non adjacent pairs of vertices have non unit distances When this is possible the abstract graph is isomorphic to the unit distance graph of the chosen locations Alternatively some sources use a broader definition allowing non adjacent pairs of vertices to be at unit distance The resulting graphs are the subgraphs of the unit distance graphs as defined here 2 Where the terminology may be ambiguous the graphs in which non edges must be a non unit distance apart may be called strict unit distance graphs 3 or faithful unit distance graphs 2 The subgraphs of unit distance graphs are equivalently the graphs that can be drawn in the plane using only one edge length 4 For brevity this article refers to these as non strict unit distance graphs Unit distance graphs should not be confused with unit disk graphs which connect pairs of points when their distance is less than or equal to one and are frequently used to model wireless communication networks 5 Examples EditThe complete graph on two vertices is a unit distance graph as is the complete graph on three vertices the triangle graph but not the complete graph on four vertices 3 Generalizing the triangle graph every cycle graph is a unit distance graph realized by a regular polygon 4 Two finite unit distance graphs connected at a single shared vertex yield another unit distance graph as one can be rotated with respect to the other to avoid undesired additional unit distances 6 By thus connecting graphs every finite tree or cactus graph may be realized as a unit distance graph 7 nbsp The hypercube graph Q 4 displaystyle Q 4 nbsp has 16 vertices and 32 unit distances nbsp The Hamming graph H 3 3 displaystyle H 3 3 nbsp has 27 vertices and 81 unit distances Any Cartesian product of unit distance graphs produces another unit distance graph however the same is not true for some other common graph products For instance the strong product of graphs applied to any two non empty graphs produces complete subgraphs with four vertices which are not unit distance graphs The Cartesian products of path graphs form grid graphs of any dimension the Cartesian products of the complete graph on two vertices are the hypercube graphs 8 and the Cartesian products of triangle graphs are the Hamming graphs H d 3 displaystyle H d 3 nbsp 9 Other specific graphs that are unit distance graphs include the Petersen graph 10 the Heawood graph 11 the wheel graph W 7 displaystyle W 7 nbsp the only wheel graph that is a unit distance graph 3 and the Moser spindle and Golomb graph small 4 chromatic unit distance graphs 12 All generalized Petersen graphs such as the Mobius Kantor graph depicted are non strict unit distance graphs 13 Matchstick graphs are a special case of unit distance graphs in which no edges cross Every matchstick graph is a planar graph 14 but some otherwise planar unit distance graphs such as the Moser spindle have a crossing in every representation as a unit distance graph Additionally in the context of unit distance graphs the term planar should be used with care as some authors use it to refer to the plane in which the unit distances are defined rather than to a prohibition on crossings 3 The penny graphs are an even more special case of unit distance and matchstick graphs in which every non adjacent pair of vertices are more than one unit apart 14 Properties EditNumber of edges Edit See also Erdos distinct distances problem Unsolved problem in mathematics How many unit distances can be determined by a set of n displaystyle n nbsp points more unsolved problems in mathematics Paul Erdos 1946 posed the problem of estimating how many pairs of points in a set of n displaystyle n nbsp points could be at unit distance from each other In graph theoretic terms the question asks how dense a unit distance graph can be and Erdos s publication on this question was one of the first works in extremal graph theory 15 The hypercube graphs and Hamming graphs provide a lower bound on the number of unit distances proportional to n log n displaystyle n log n nbsp By considering points in a square grid with carefully chosen spacing Erdos found an improved lower bound of the formn 1 c log log n displaystyle n 1 c log log n nbsp for a constant c displaystyle c nbsp and offered 500 for a proof of whether the number of unit distances can also be bounded above by a function of this form 16 The best known upper bound for this problem is 29 n 4 4 3 1 936 n 4 3 displaystyle sqrt 3 frac 29n 4 4 approx 1 936n 4 3 nbsp This bound can be viewed as counting incidences between points and unit circles and is closely related to the crossing number inequality and to the Szemeredi Trotter theorem on incidences between points and lines 17 For small values of n displaystyle n nbsp up to 14 as of 2022 update the exact maximum number of possible edges is known For n 2 3 4 displaystyle n 2 3 4 dots nbsp these numbers of edges are 18 1 3 5 7 9 12 14 18 20 23 27 30 33 sequence A186705 in the OEIS Forbidden subgraphs Edit If a given graph G displaystyle G nbsp is not a non strict unit distance graph neither is any supergraph H displaystyle H nbsp of G displaystyle G nbsp A similar idea works for strict unit distance graphs but using the concept of an induced subgraph a subgraph formed from all edges between the pairs of vertices in a given subset of vertices If G displaystyle G nbsp is not a strict unit distance graph then neither is any other H displaystyle H nbsp that has G displaystyle G nbsp as an induced subgraph Because of these relations between whether a subgraph or its supergraph is a unit distance graph it is possible to describe unit distance graphs by their forbidden subgraphs These are the minimal graphs that are not unit distance graphs of the given type They can be used to determine whether a given graph G displaystyle G nbsp is a unit distance graph of either type G displaystyle G nbsp is a non strict unit distance graph if and only if G displaystyle G nbsp is not a supergraph of a forbidden graph for the non strict unit distance graphs G displaystyle G nbsp is a strict unit distance graph if and only if G displaystyle G nbsp is not an induced supergraph of a forbidden graph for the strict unit distance graphs 8 For both the non strict and strict unit distance graphs the forbidden graphs include both the complete graph K 4 displaystyle K 4 nbsp and the complete bipartite graph K 2 3 displaystyle K 2 3 nbsp For K 2 3 displaystyle K 2 3 nbsp wherever the vertices on the two vertex side of this graph are placed there are at most two positions at unit distance from them to place the other three vertices so it is impossible to place all three vertices at distinct points 8 These are the only two forbidden graphs for the non strict unit distance graphs on up to five vertices there are six forbidden graphs on up to seven vertices 6 and 74 on graphs up to nine vertices Because gluing two unit distance graphs or subgraphs thereof at a vertex produce strict respectively non strict unit distance graphs every forbidden graph is a biconnected graph one that cannot be formed by this gluing process 19 The wheel graph W 7 displaystyle W 7 nbsp can be realized as a strict unit distance graph with six of its vertices forming a unit regular hexagon and the seventh at the center of the hexagon Removing one of the edges from the center vertex produces a subgraph that still has unit length edges but which is not a strict unit distance graph The regular hexagon placement of its vertices is the only one way up to congruence to place the vertices at distinct locations such that adjacent vertices are a unit distance apart and this placement also puts the two endpoints of the missing edge at unit distance Thus it is a forbidden graph for the strict unit distance graphs 20 but not one of the six forbidden graphs for the non strict unit distance graphs Other examples of graphs that are non strict unit distance graphs but not strict unit distance graphs include the graph formed by removing an outer edge from W 7 displaystyle W 7 nbsp and the six vertex graph formed from a triangular prism by removing an edge from one of its triangles 19 Algebraic numbers and rigidity Edit Main article Beckman Quarles theorem For every algebraic number a displaystyle alpha nbsp it is possible to construct a unit distance graph G displaystyle G nbsp in which some pair of vertices are at distance a displaystyle alpha nbsp in all unit distance representations of G displaystyle G nbsp 21 This result implies a finite version of the Beckman Quarles theorem for any two points p displaystyle p nbsp and q displaystyle q nbsp at distance a displaystyle alpha nbsp from each other there exists a finite rigid unit distance graph containing p displaystyle p nbsp and q displaystyle q nbsp such that any transformation of the plane that preserves the unit distances in this graph also preserves the distance between p displaystyle p nbsp and q displaystyle q nbsp 22 The full Beckman Quarles theorem states that the only transformations of the Euclidean plane or a higher dimensional Euclidean space that preserve unit distances are the isometries Equivalently for the infinite unit distance graph generated by all the points in the plane all graph automorphisms preserve all of the distances in the plane not just the unit distances 23 If a displaystyle alpha nbsp is an algebraic number of modulus 1 that is not a root of unity then the integer combinations of powers of a displaystyle alpha nbsp form a finitely generated subgroup of the additive group of complex numbers whose unit distance graph has infinite degree For instance a displaystyle alpha nbsp can be chosen as one of the two complex roots of the polynomial z 4 z 3 z 2 z 1 displaystyle z 4 z 3 z 2 z 1 nbsp producing an infinite degree unit distance graph with four generators 24 Coloring Edit Main article Hadwiger Nelson problem Unsolved problem in mathematics What is the largest possible chromatic number of a unit distance graph more unsolved problems in mathematics The Hadwiger Nelson problem concerns the chromatic number of unit distance graphs and more specifically of the infinite unit distance graph formed from all points of the Euclidean plane By the de Bruijn Erdos theorem which assumes the axiom of choice this is equivalent to asking for the largest chromatic number of a finite unit distance graph There exist unit distance graphs requiring five colors in any proper coloring 25 and all unit distance graphs can be colored with at most seven colors 26 nbsp A seven coloring of the infinite unit distance graph formed from all points of the plane and the four chromatic Moser spindle embedded as a unit distance graphAnswering another question of Paul Erdos it is possible for triangle free unit distance graphs to require four colors 27 Enumeration Edit The number of strict unit distance graphs on n 4 displaystyle n geq 4 nbsp labeled vertices is at most 2 n n 1 2 n O 2 4 o 1 n log 2 n displaystyle binom n n 1 2n O left 2 bigl 4 o 1 bigr n log 2 n right nbsp as expressed using big O notation and little o notation Generalization to higher dimensions EditThe definition of a unit distance graph may naturally be generalized to any higher dimensional Euclidean space In three dimensions unit distance graphs of n displaystyle n nbsp points have at most n 3 2 b n displaystyle n 3 2 beta n nbsp edges where b displaystyle beta nbsp is a very slowly growing function related to the inverse Ackermann function 28 This result leads to a similar bound on the number of edges of three dimensional relative neighborhood graphs 29 In four or more dimensions any complete bipartite graph is a unit distance graph realized by placing the points on two perpendicular circles with a common center so unit distance graphs can be dense graphs 7 The enumeration formulas for unit distance graphs generalize to higher dimensions and shows that in dimensions four or more the number of strict unit distance graphs is much larger than the number of subgraphs of unit distance graphs 2 Any finite graph may be embedded as a unit distance graph in a sufficiently high dimension Some graphs may need very different dimensions for embeddings as non strict unit distance graphs and as strict unit distance graphs For instance the 2 n displaystyle 2n nbsp vertex crown graph may be embedded in four dimensions as a non strict unit distance graph that is so that all its edges have unit length However it requires at least n 2 displaystyle n 2 nbsp dimensions to be embedded as a strict unit distance graph so that its edges are the only unit distance pairs 30 The dimension needed to realize any given graph as a strict unit graph is at most twice its maximum degree 31 Computational complexity EditConstructing a unit distance graph from its points is an important step for other algorithms for finding congruent copies of some pattern in a larger point set These algorithms use this construction to search for candidate positions where one of the distances in the pattern is present and then use other methods to test the rest of the pattern for each candidate 32 A method of Matousek 1993 can be applied to this problem 32 yielding an algorithm for finding a planar point set s unit distance graph in time n 4 3 2 O log n displaystyle n 4 3 2 O log n nbsp where log displaystyle log nbsp is the slowly growing iterated logarithm function 33 It is NP hard and more specifically complete for the existential theory of the reals to test whether a given graph is a strict or non strict unit distance graph in the plane 34 It is also NP complete to determine whether a planar unit distance graph has a Hamiltonian cycle even when the graph s vertices all have known integer coordinates 35 References EditNotes Edit Griffiths 2019 a b c d Alon amp Kupavskii 2014 a b c d Gervacio Lim amp Maehara 2008 a b Carmi et al 2008 Huson amp Sen 1995 a b Chilakamarri amp Mahoney 1995 a b Erdos Harary amp Tutte 1965 a b c Horvat amp Pisanski 2010 Brouwer amp Haemers 2012 Erdos Harary amp Tutte 1965 Griffiths 2019 Gerbracht 2009 Soifer 2008 pp 14 15 19 Zitnik Horvat amp Pisanski 2012 a b Lavollee amp Swanepoel 2022 Szemeredi 2016 Erdos 1990 Spencer Szemeredi amp Trotter 1984 Clarkson et al 1990 Pach amp Tardos 2005 Agoston amp Palvolgyi 2022 Agoston amp Palvolgyi 2022 a b Globus amp Parshall 2020 Soifer 2008 p 94 Maehara 1991 1992 Tyszka 2000 Beckman amp Quarles 1953 Radchenko 2021 Langin 2018 de Grey 2018 Soifer 2008 p 17 Wormald 1979 Chilakamarri 1995 O Donnell 1995 Clarkson et al 1990 Jaromczyk amp Toussaint 1992 Erdos amp Simonovits 1980 Maehara amp Rodl 1990 a b Brass 2002 Matousek 1993 see also Chan amp Zheng 2022 for a closely related algorithm for listing point line incidences in time O n 4 3 displaystyle O n 4 3 nbsp Schaefer 2013 Itai Papadimitriou amp Szwarcfiter 1982 Sources Edit Agoston Peter Palvolgyi Domotor April 2022 An improved constant factor for the unit distance problem Studia Scientiarum Mathematicarum Hungarica Akademiai Kiado Zrt 59 1 40 57 arXiv 2006 06285 doi 10 1556 012 2022 01517 S2CID 218479287 Alon Noga Kupavskii Andrey 2014 Two notions of unit distance graphs PDF Journal of Combinatorial Theory Series A 125 1 17 doi 10 1016 j jcta 2014 02 006 MR 3207464 S2CID 12043969 Beckman F S Quarles D A Jr 1953 On isometries of Euclidean spaces Proceedings of the American Mathematical Society 4 5 810 815 doi 10 2307 2032415 JSTOR 2032415 MR 0058193 a href Template Citation html title Template Citation citation a CS1 maint multiple names authors list link Brass Peter 2002 Combinatorial geometry problems in pattern recognition Discrete amp Computational Geometry 28 4 495 510 doi 10 1007 s00454 002 2884 3 MR 1949897 Brouwer Andries E Haemers Willem H 2012 Spectra of Graphs Universitext New York Springer p 178 doi 10 1007 978 1 4614 1939 6 ISBN 978 1 4614 1938 9 MR 2882891 Carmi Paz Dujmovic Vida Morin Pat Wood David R 2008 Distinct distances in graph drawings Electronic Journal of Combinatorics 15 1 Research Paper 107 arXiv 0804 3690 doi 10 37236 831 MR 2438579 S2CID 2955082 Chan Timothy M Zheng Da Wei 2022 Hopcroft s problem log star shaving 2d fractional cascading and decision trees in Naor Joseph Seffi Buchbinder Niv eds Proceedings of the 2022 ACM SIAM Symposium on Discrete Algorithms SODA 2022 Virtual Conference Alexandria VA USA January 9 12 2022 Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics pp 190 210 arXiv 2111 03744 doi 10 1137 1 9781611977073 10 S2CID 243847672 Chilakamarri Kiran B 1995 A 4 chromatic unit distance graph with no triangles Geombinatorics 4 3 64 76 MR 1313386 Chilakamarri Kiran B Mahoney Carolyn R 1995 Maximal and minimal forbidden unit distance graphs in the plane Bulletin of the Institute of Combinatorics and Its Applications 13 35 43 MR 1314500 as cited by Globus amp Parshall 2020 Clarkson Kenneth L Edelsbrunner Herbert Guibas Leonidas J Sharir Micha Welzl Emo 1990 Combinatorial complexity bounds for arrangements of curves and spheres Discrete amp Computational Geometry 5 2 99 160 doi 10 1007 BF02187783 MR 1032370 S2CID 28143698 de Grey Aubrey D N J 2018 The chromatic number of the plane is at least 5 Geombinatorics 28 5 18 arXiv 1804 02385 MR 3820926 Erdos Paul 1946 On sets of distances of n displaystyle n nbsp points American Mathematical Monthly 53 5 248 250 doi 10 2307 2305092 JSTOR 2305092 Erdos Paul Harary Frank Tutte William T 1965 On the dimension of a graph PDF Mathematika 12 2 118 122 doi 10 1112 S0025579300005222 hdl 2027 42 152495 MR 0188096 Erdos Paul Simonovits Miklos 1980 On the chromatic number of geometric graphs Ars Combinatoria 9 229 246 as cited by Soifer 2008 p 97 Erdos Paul 1990 Some of my favourite unsolved problems in Baker A Bollobas B Hajnal A eds A tribute to Paul Erdos Cambridge University Press pp 467 478 ISBN 0 521 38101 0 MR 1117038 see in particular p 475 Gerbracht Eberhard H A 2009 Eleven unit distance embeddings of the Heawood graph arXiv 0912 5395 Bibcode 2009arXiv0912 5395G Gervacio Severino V Lim Yvette F Maehara Hiroshi 2008 Planar unit distance graphs having planar unit distance complement Discrete Mathematics 308 10 1973 1984 doi 10 1016 j disc 2007 04 050 Globus Aidan Parshall Hans 2020 Small unit distance graphs in the plane Bulletin of the Institute of Combinatorics and Its Applications 90 107 138 arXiv 1905 07829 MR 4156400 Griffiths Martin June 2019 103 27 A property of a particular unit distance graph The Mathematical Gazette 103 557 353 356 doi 10 1017 mag 2019 74 S2CID 233361952 Horvat Boris Pisanski Tomaz 2010 Products of unit distance graphs Discrete Mathematics 310 12 1783 1792 doi 10 1016 j disc 2009 11 035 MR 2610282 Huson Mark L Sen Arunabha 1995 Broadcast scheduling algorithms for radio networks Military Communications Conference IEEE MILCOM 95 vol 2 pp 647 651 doi 10 1109 MILCOM 1995 483546 ISBN 0 7803 2489 7 S2CID 62039740 Itai Alon Papadimitriou Christos H Szwarcfiter Jayme Luiz 1982 Hamilton paths in grid graphs SIAM Journal on Computing 11 4 676 686 CiteSeerX 10 1 1 383 1078 doi 10 1137 0211056 MR 0677661 Jaromczyk Jerzy W Toussaint Godfried T 1992 Relative neighborhood graphs and their relatives Proceedings of the IEEE 80 9 1502 1517 doi 10 1109 5 163414 Langin Katie April 18 2018 Amateur mathematician cracks decades old math problem Science Lavollee Jeremy Swanepoel Konrad J 2022 Bounding the number of edges of matchstick graphs SIAM Journal on Discrete Mathematics 36 1 777 785 arXiv 2108 07522 doi 10 1137 21M1441134 MR 4399020 S2CID 237142624 Maehara Hiroshi 1991 Distances in a rigid unit distance graph in the plane Discrete Applied Mathematics 31 2 193 200 doi 10 1016 0166 218X 91 90070 D Maehara Hiroshi 1992 Extending a flexible unit bar framework to a rigid one Discrete Mathematics 108 1 3 167 174 doi 10 1016 0012 365X 92 90671 2 MR 1189840 Maehara Hiroshi Rodl Vojtech 1990 On the dimension to represent a graph by a unit distance graph Graphs and Combinatorics 6 4 365 367 doi 10 1007 BF01787703 S2CID 31148911 Matousek Jiri 1993 Range searching with efficient hierarchical cuttings Discrete amp Computational Geometry 10 2 157 182 doi 10 1007 BF02573972 MR 1220545 O Donnell Paul 1995 A 40 vertex 4 chromatic triangle free unit distance graph Geombinatorics 5 1 31 34 MR 1337155 Pach Janos Tardos Gabor 2005 Forbidden patterns and unit distances in Mitchell Joseph S B Rote Gunter eds Proceedings of the 21st ACM Symposium on Computational Geometry Pisa Italy June 6 8 2005 Association for Computing Machinery pp 1 9 doi 10 1145 1064092 1064096 MR 2460341 S2CID 18752227 Radchenko Danylo 2021 Unit distance graphs and algebraic integers Discrete amp Computational Geometry 66 1 269 272 doi 10 1007 s00454 019 00152 4 hdl 21 11116 0000 0006 9CFD E MR 4270642 S2CID 119682489 Schaefer Marcus 2013 Realizability of graphs and linkages in Pach Janos ed Thirty Essays on Geometric Graph Theory Springer pp 461 482 CiteSeerX 10 1 1 220 9651 doi 10 1007 978 1 4614 0110 0 24 ISBN 978 1 4614 0109 4 Soifer Alexander 2008 The Mathematical Coloring Book Springer Verlag ISBN 978 0 387 74640 1 Spencer Joel Szemeredi Endre Trotter William T 1984 Unit distances in the Euclidean plane in Bollobas Bela ed Graph Theory and Combinatorics London Academic Press pp 293 308 ISBN 978 0 12 111760 3 MR 0777185 Szemeredi Endre 2016 Erdos s unit distance problem in Nash John Forbes Jr Rassias Michael Th eds Open Problems in Mathematics Cham Switzerland Springer pp 459 477 doi 10 1007 978 3 319 32162 2 15 MR 3526946 a href Template Citation html title Template Citation citation a CS1 maint multiple names editors list link Tyszka Apoloniusz 2000 Discrete versions of the Beckman Quarles theorem Aequationes Mathematicae 59 1 2 124 133 arXiv math 9904047 doi 10 1007 PL00000119 MR 1741475 S2CID 14803182 Wormald Nicholas 1979 A 4 chromatic graph with a special plane drawing Journal of the Australian Mathematical Society Series A 28 1 1 8 doi 10 1017 S1446788700014865 MR 0541161 S2CID 124067465 Zitnik Arjana Horvat Boris Pisanski Tomaz 2012 All generalized Petersen graphs are unit distance graphs Journal of the Korean Mathematical Society 49 3 475 491 doi 10 4134 JKMS 2012 49 3 475 MR 2953031External links EditVenkatasubramanian Suresh Problem 39 Distances among Point Sets in R2 and R3 The Open Problems Project Weisstein Eric W Unit Distance Graph MathWorld Retrieved from https en 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