Packing three copies of a tree into a complete graph (Q1209730)

A graph \(G\) of order \(n\) is said to be 3-placeable if there are three edge-disjoint copies of \(G\) in the complete graph \(K_ n\). M. Woźniak and A. Wojda (unpublished) proved that every graph \(G\) of order \(n\) and size at most \(n-2\) is 3-placeable if \(G\neq K_ 3\cup 2K_ 1\) or \(K_ 4\cup 4K_ 1\). In this paper the authors prove that every tree \(T\) of order \(n\geq 7\) having maximum degree at most \(n-3\) is 3-placeable. The reviewer takes the opportunity to say that in 1992 T. Hasunuma and Y. Shibata of Gunma University, Japan, also proved the same result independently.