Abstract
The triangle removal lemma states that a simple graph with o(n3) triangles can be made triangle-free by removing o(n2) edges. It is natural to ask if this widely used result can be extended to multi-graphs. In this short paper we rule out the possibility of such an extension by showing that there are multi-graphs with only n2+o(1) triangles that are still far from being triangle-free. On the other hand, we show that for some slowly growing function g(n) = w(1), if a multi-graph has only g(n)n2 triangles then it must be close to being triangle-free. The proof relies on variants of the Ruzsa-Szemerédi theorem [15].
Original language | English |
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Article number | N11 |
Journal | Electronic Journal of Combinatorics |
Volume | 16 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 20 Mar 2009 |
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Theoretical Computer Science
- Geometry and Topology
- Discrete Mathematics and Combinatorics
- Computational Theory and Mathematics
- Applied Mathematics