On 3-colorings of plane graphs (Q705042)

The main result of the paper states that any \(3\)-colouring of the vertices of a face of degree at least \(11\) in a planar graph \(G\) without cycles of length \(4\), \(5\) and \(7\) and with no pair of intersecting triangles (i.e. every two 3-cycles of \(G\) are vertex-disjoint) can be extended to a \(3\)-colouring of the whole graph \(G\). The proof is based on a discharging method. The result supports a conjecture of \textit{O.V. Borodin} and \textit{A. Raspaud} [J. Comb. Theory, Ser. B 88, 17--27 (2003; Zbl 1023.05046)] which claims that every planar graph without \(5\)-cycles and intersecting triangles is \(3\)-colourable.