Two conjectures on edge-colouring (Q1123197)

A simple graph G is said to be Class 1 (resp. Class 2) if \(\chi'(G)=\Delta(G)\) (resp. \(\chi'(G)=\Delta(G)+1)\) where \(\chi'(G)\) is the chromatic index of G and \(\Delta(G)\) is the maximum degree of G. If G satisfies the inequality \(| E(G)| >\Delta (G)[| V(G)|],\) then G is said to be overfull. A. G. Chetwynd and the author made the following conjecture in 1986: Conjecture 1: Let G be a simple graph with \(\Delta (G)>\frac{1}{3}| V(G)|\). Then G is Class 2 if and only if G contains an overfull subgraph H with \(\Delta(H)=\Delta(G).\) In this note, the author proves that if Conjecture 1 is true, then the following long standing conjecture is also true. Conjecture 2: Let G be a regular simple graph of even order such that the degree d(G) of G is at least \(1/2\) \(| V(G)|\). Then G is Class 1.