Total Domination and Matching Numbers in Claw-Free Graphs

  • Michael A. Henning
  • Anders Yeo

Abstract

A set $M$ of edges of a graph $G$ is a matching if no two edges in $M$ are incident to the same vertex. The matching number of $G$ is the maximum cardinality of a matching of $G$. A set $S$ of vertices in $G$ is a total dominating set of $G$ if every vertex of $G$ is adjacent to some vertex in $S$. The minimum cardinality of a total dominating set of $G$ is the total domination number of $G$. If $G$ does not contain $K_{1,3}$ as an induced subgraph, then $G$ is said to be claw-free. We observe that the total domination number of every claw-free graph with minimum degree at least three is bounded above by its matching number. In this paper, we use transversals in hypergraphs to characterize connected claw-free graphs with minimum degree at least three that have equal total domination and matching numbers.

Published
2006-07-28
Article Number
R59