On the b-chromatic number of some graph products (Q2915433)

A \(b\)-colouring of a graph \(G\) is a proper vertex colouring of \(G\) such that every colour class contains a vertex that has at least one neighbour in every other colour class. The \(b\)-chromatic number of a graph \(G\) is the largest integer \(\varphi(G)\) for which \(G\) has a \(b\)-colouring with \(\varphi(G)\) colours. The invariant \(\varphi(G)\) has the chromatic number of \(G\) as a trivial lower bound and \(\Delta(G)+1\) as a trivial upper bound where \(\Delta(G)\) denotes the maximum degree of \(G\).NEWLINENEWLINE The authors determine upper and lower bounds for the \(b\)-chromatic number of certain graph products as the strong product, the lexicographic product and the direct product of graphs. Moreover, they give some exact values for the \(b\)-chromatic number for special graphs as paths, cycles, stars, and complete graphs.