On some extremal and probabilistic questions for tree posets (Q6117424)

Summary: Given two posets \(P\), \(Q\) we say that \(Q\) is \(P\)-free if \(Q\) does not contain a copy of \(P\). The size of the largest \(P\)-free family in \(2^{[n]}\), denoted by \(La(n, P)\), has been extensively studied since the 1980s. We consider several related problems. For posets \(P\) whose Hasse diagrams are trees and have radius at most \(2\), we prove that there are \(2^{(1+o(1))La(n, P)} P\)-free families in \(2^{[n]}\), thereby confirming a conjecture of \textit{D. Gerbner} et al. [ibid. 28, No. 1, Research Paper P1.40, 20 p. (2021; Zbl 1459.05324)] in this case. For such \(P\) we also resolve the random version of the \(P\)-free problem, thus generalising the random version of Sperner's theorem due to \textit{J. Balogh} et al. [J. Comb. Theory, Ser. A 128, 104--110 (2014; Zbl 1301.05347)], and \textit{M. Collares} and \textit{R. Morris} [Random Struct. Algorithms 49, No. 2, 308--321 (2016; Zbl 1344.05142)]. Additionally, we make a general conjecture that, roughly speaking, asserts that subfamilies of \(2^{[n]}\) of size sufficiently above \(La(n, P)\) robustly contain \(P\), for any poset \(P\) whose Hasse diagram is a tree.