Regularity of powers of forests and cycles (Q902955)

Let \(I\) be a homogenous ideal in the polynomial ring \(R=k[x_1,\ldots,x_n]\). It is well-known that there exist integers \(a,b\) and \(s_0\) such that \(\mathrm{reg}(I^s)=as+b\) for all \(s\geq s_0\). But in general finding the values of \(a,b\) and \(s_0\) is a widely open problem. Even in the case that \(I\) is an edge ideal of a graph, for some few families of graphs, these values are known. In the paper under review, the authors consider the edge ideal of two families of graphs, forests and cycles. For these families of graphs the linear function which presents \(\mathrm{reg}(I(G)^s)\) was obtained. More precisely, when \(G\) is a forest, by an inductive argument it was shown that for any \(s\geq 1\), \(\mathrm{reg}(I^s)=2s+\nu(G)-1\), where \(\nu(G)\) is the induced matching number of \(G\), that is the largest size of subsets \(\{e_1,\ldots,e_m\}\subseteq E(G)\) such that the induced subgraph of \(G\) on \(\bigcup_{i=1}^m e_i\) has exactly \(m\) edges. For cycle graphs the same formula for \(\mathrm{reg}(I(G)^s)\) was proved. Moreover, for graphs with a Hamiltonian path it was shown that \(\mathrm{reg}(I(G))\leq \lfloor\frac{|V(G)|+1}{3}\rfloor+1\) and for some Hamiltonian graphs it was proved that \(\mathrm{reg}g(I(G))\leq \lfloor\frac{|V(G)|}{3}\rfloor+1\).