Co-cliques and star complements in extremal strongly regular graphs (Q864564)

The author characterizes the Schläfli graph and the McLaughlin graph as the only extremal strongly regular graphs in which an eigenvalue of largest multiplicity is positive and a corresponding star complement has the form \(K_{1,2} \cup (t-s-1)K_1\) \((2\leq s\leq t-1)\). As a corollary, it is shown that the independence number of an extremal strongly regular graph in which an eigenvalue \(\mu\) of largest multiplicity is positive, is at most \(4\mu^2 + 4\mu - 2\), with equality if and only if the graph is a pentagon, the Schläfli graph, or the McLaughlin graph.