Extremal Problems on Finite Sets and Posets
Casey Tompkins Advisor: Gyula O.H. Katona
April 14, 2015 Contents
0.1 Acknowledgements ...... 1
1 Introduction 2 1.1 Background on extremal set theory ...... 2 1.2 Background on forbidden subposet problems ...... 11
2 An improvement on the general bound on the largest family of subsets avoiding a subposet 17 2.1 Introduction ...... 17 2.2 Interval chains and the proof of Theorem 14 ...... 18 2.3 A different proof of Corollary 1 using generalized diamonds ...... 25 2.4 Proof of Proposition 20 ...... 27
3 A cyclic chain decomposition method for forbidding subposets 30 3.1 Introduction ...... 30 3.2 Forbidding S and the first cycle decomposition ...... 33 0 3.3 Forbidding Yk and Yk ...... 38 3.4 Forbidding induced Y and Y 0 and second cycle decomposition ...... 40
4 The maximum size of intersecting P -free families 43 4.1 Intersecting k-Sperner families ...... 46 4.2 Intersecting B-free families ...... 52 4.3 Bollob´asand Greene-Katona-Kleitman-type inequalities ...... 58 4.4 Results for general posets P ...... 59
1 5 A De Bruijn-Erd˝ostheorem for posets 62 5.1 Lines in posets ...... 65 5.1.1 Proof of Theorem 29 ...... 65 5.2 Lines in graphs ...... 68 5.2.1 Proof of Theorem 30 ...... 68
2 Abstract
The overarching theme of the thesis is the investigation of extremal problems involving forbid- den partially ordered sets (posets). In particular, we will be concerned with the function La(n, P ), defined to be the maximum number of sets we can take in the Boolean lattice 2[n] without intro- ducing the relations of a poset P as containment relations among the sets. This function plays an analogous role in the setting of nonuniform hypergraphs (set systems) as the extremal function ex(n, G) in graph theory and has already been studied extensively. While this type of problem was formally introduced in 1983, there have already been more than 50 papers on the subject. The majority of the results involve bounding La(n, P ) both in a general sense, as well as for numerous specific cases of posets. The thesis is divided into 5 main chapters. The first chapter gives a summary of the history of forbidden poset problems as well as the relevant background information from extremal set theory. In the second chapter we give a significant improvement of the general bounds on La(n, P ) as a function of the height of the poset h(P ) and the size of the poset |P | due to Burcsi and Nagy and later Chen and Li. The resulting bound is in a certain sense best possible. We also give an improvement of the bound on the so-called Lubell function in the induced version of the problem, and we introduce a new chain counting technique which may have additional applications. The results in this chapter were joint work with D´anielGr´oszand Abhishek Methuku. The third chapter introduces a new partitioning technique on cyclic permutations. In this chapter we find a surprising generalization of a result of De Bonis, Katona and Swanepoel on a poset known as the butterfly. Namely, we show that one can introduce a subdivision to one of the edges of the Hasse diagram of this poset and prove that nonetheless the same bound holds on its extremal number. Using the new partitioning technique, we also determine the exact bound for the La function of an infinite class of pairs of posets. The results in this chapter were joint work with Abhishek Methuku. In the fourth chapter we introduce a new variation on the extremal subposet problem. Namely, we assume that the family must also be intersecting. We give a novel generalization of the partition method of Griggs and Li and prove an exact bound for intersecting, butterfly-free families. We also give a new proof of a result of Gerbner on intersecting k-Sperner families and determine the equality cases for the first time. The results in this chapter were joint work with D´anielGerbner and Abhishek Methuku. In the fifth chapter we prove a new version of the De Bruijn Erd˝ostheorem for partially ordered sets, as well as another version in a graph setting. The results in this subsection were joint work with Pierre Aboulker, Guillaume Lagarde, David Malec and Abhishek Methuku.
2 0.1 Acknowledgements
I would like to express my thanks to my advisor Gyula O.H. Katona for his continued support during my time as a student at Central European University. I also want to thank several other professors who have been gracious with their time in discussing combinatorial problems with me, in particular Zolt´anF¨uredi,L´aszl´oCsirmaz, Ervin Gy˝ori,Gergely Harcos, P´alHeged˝us,Mikl´os Istv´an,Imre Ruzsa and Mikl´osSimonovits. I would also like to thank four professors who were a large influence on me during my undergraduate years, Robert Holliday, Michael Kash, Edward Packel and David Yuen. I would like to thank several friends some of whom were collaborators: D´anielGerbner, D´anielGr´osz,Guillaume Lagarde, D´anielJo´o,Scott Kensell, Milan Kidd, Wei-Tian Li, David Malec, Abhishek Methuku, D¨om¨ot¨orP´alv¨olgyi,Ioana Petre, Daniel Tietzer, Johannes Wachs, Yao Wang. Finally, I would like to thank my parents Lyn Estka and Steven Tompkins for their loving support.
1 Chapter 1
Introduction
Most of the results in this thesis are on extremal problems on finite sets. More specifically, the problems we consider involve maximizing the number of sets we can take in a collection F ⊆ 2[n], provided that if we view F as a partially ordered set (poset) with respect to the inclusion relation ⊆, then F does not contain a given poset P as a subposet (induced or noninduced). In the following subsections we first give an overview of the terminology and basic results from extremal set theory which we will need. We then move on to survey the history of forbidden poset problems. Furthermore, we describe the essential techniques developed so far.
1.1 Background on extremal set theory
The set {1, 2, . . . , n} is denoted by [n], and for any set X, the power set of X is denoted by 2X . Sets F ⊆ 2[n] are referred to as set families, hypergraphs, or collections of sets. The collection of [n] th [n] all subsets of [n] which have size k is denoted k and is referred to as the k level of 2 .A hypergraph F is called r-uniform if every set in F has cardinality r. For an r-uniform hypergraph F, we denote the shadow and shade of F respectively by
∆F = {G : |G| = r − 1 and there exists F ∈ F such that G ⊂ F };
∇F = {G : |G| = r + 1 and there exists F ∈ F such that F ⊂ G}.
We will consider problems where the goal is to maximize |F| over all F ⊆ 2[n] subject to various constraints. Among the most fundamental results in extremal set theory is the famous theorem of
2 Sperner [74]. A collection of sets A is said to be an antichain (or Sperner family) if there do not exist two sets A and B in A such that A ⊂ B. Sperner proved the following:
Theorem 1 (Sperner [74]). Let A ⊆ 2[n] be an antichain, then
n |A| ≤ . bn/2c