On the forcing spectrum of generalized Petersen graphs P(n,2)

Abstract: The forcing number of a perfect matching

M

of a graph

G

is the smallest cardinality of subsets of

M

that are contained in no other perfect matchings of

G

. The forcing spectrum of

G

is the collection of forcing numbers of all perfect matchings of

G

. In this paper, we classify the perfect matchings of a generalized Petersen graph

P (n, 2)

in two types, and show that the forcing spectrum is the union of two integer intervals. For

n g e 34

, it is

l e f t [l c e i l f r a c n 12 c e i l + 1, l c e i l f r a c n + 3 7 c e i l + d e l t a (n) i g h t] c u p l e f t [l c e i l f r a c n + 2 6 c e i l, l c e i l f r a c n 4 c e i l i g h t]

, where

d e l t a (n) = 1

if

n e q u i v 3

(mod 7), and

d e l t a (n) = 0

otherwise.

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