Graph on Surfaces

A motivating problem

A video game world:

Surfaces

A surface is a space that "locally looks like" $\mathbb{R}^2$

  • $\mathbb{R}^2$
  • Sphere $S^2$
  • Torus $T$
  • Mobius band $M$...

Couldn't the game designers have done better?

Answer: After break

The Utilities Question

Complete bipartite graphs

The complete bipartite graph $K_{n,m}$ has $n$ red vertices, $m$ blue vertices, and every red vertex is connected to every blue vertex.

Planar graphs

A graph is planar if it can be drawn on a sheet of paper without any edges crossing

So the utilities question can be rephrased as: is $K_{3,3}$ planar?

How do you a show a graph isn't planar?

Need a way to organize the cases...

Topological interlude: Jordan curve theorem

Every simple closed curve separates the plane into an inside and an outside

Okay, how does that help...

Key idea:

If $\Gamma$ can be drawn in the plane, any cycle has to make a loop; every other edge must be either inside or outside.

Want as many edges as possible in the loop. Best case: $G$ is Hamiltonian

Eventually, this leads to the "Planarity Algorithm", but first, $K_{3,3}$ and $K_5$...