Shellability of 3-cut complexes of squared cycle graphs (Q7009502)

Inspired by Ralf Fröberg's theorem [\textit{R. Fröberg}, Banach Cent. Publ. None, 57--70 (1990; Zbl 0741.13006)], which establishes a connection between the Stanley-Reisner ideal of a simplicial complex and the clique complex of a chordal graph, Mark Denker introduced the concept of \(k\)-cut complexes of graphs in his master's thesis. For an integer \(k \ge 1\), the \(k\)-cut complex of a graph \(G\), denoted by \(\Delta_k(G)\), is defined as the simplicial complex whose facets (maximal simplices) are subsets \(\sigma \subseteq V(G)\) such that \(|\sigma| = |V(G)| - k\) and the induced subgraph \(G[V(G) \setminus \sigma]\) is disconnected.\N\NIt is known from \textit{M. Bayer} et al. [SIAM J. Discrete Math. 38, No. 2, 1630--1675 (2024; Zbl 1550.57012)] that \(\Delta_2(C_n)\) and \(\Delta_2(C_n^2)\) are not shellable, where \(C_n\) and \(C_n^2\) denote the cycle and squared cycle graphs, respectively. Furthermore, \textit{M. Bayer} et al. [Discrete Comput. Geom. 73, No. 2, 500--527 (2025; Zbl 1564.57020)] introduced another generalization called the total \(k\)-cut complex. For \(k \ge 1\), the total \(k\)-cut complex of a graph \(G\), denoted by \(\Delta_k^t(G)\), is the simplicial complex whose facets are subsets \(\sigma \subseteq V(G)\) satisfying \(|\sigma| = |V(G)| - k\) and such that the induced subgraph \(G[V(G) \setminus \sigma]\) contains no edges. In particular, \(\Delta_2(G) = \Delta_2^t(G)\) for any graph \(G\). They proved that for \(k \ge 3\), \(\Delta_k(C_n)\) is shellable whenever \(n \ge k + 1\). Based on their observations, they conjectured that for \(k \ge 3\), the cut complex \(\Delta_k(C_n^2)\) is shellable whenever \(n \ge k + 6\), and for \(k = 3\) and \(n \ge 9\), the Betti numbers are given by \(\binom{n - 4}{2} - 9 = \{1, 6, 12, 19, 27, \ldots\}\).\N\NIn this article, the authors confirm this conjecture for the case \(k = 3\).