Determinants of Laplacians on graphs (Q2367212)

Let \(G\) be a finite graph. The difference Laplacian matrix of \(G\) is defined as the difference between the diagonal matrix with vertex degrees on the diagonal and the adjacency matrix of \(G\). It is shown how the Laplacian can be naturally defined for edge and vertex weighted graphs. The main result is a formula that expresses the coefficients of the characteristic polynomial of the (weighted) Laplacian in terms of certain flows and closed walks in the graph. It should be mentioned that a slightly weaker version of this result (no vertex weights) has been published previously by \textit{M. Fiedler} and \textit{J. Sedláček} [On \(w\)-bases of directed graphs (in Czech), Časopis \v{P}est. Mat. 83, 214-225 (1958; Zbl 0084.195)].