Expander Families And Cayley Graphs

Expander families enjoy a wide range of applications in mathematics and computer science, and their study is a fascinating one in its own right. Expander Families and Cayley Graphs: A Beginner's Guide provides an introduction to the mathematical theory underlying these objects. The central notion in the book is that of expansion, which roughly means the quality of a graph as a communications network. Cayley graphs are certain graphs constructed from groups; they play a prominent role in the study of expander families. The isoperimetric constant, the second largest eigenvalue, the diameter, and the Kazhdan constant are four measures of the expansion quality of a Cayley graph. The book carefully develops these concepts, discussing their relationships to one another and to subgroups and quotients as well as their best-case growth rates. Topics include graph spectra (i.e., eigenvalues); a Cheeger-Buser-type inequality for regular graphs; group quotients and graph coverings; subgroups and Schreier generators; the Alon-Boppana theorem on the second largest eigenvalue of a regular graph; Ramanujan graphs; diameter estimates for Cayley graphs; the zig-zag product and its relation to semidirect products of groups; eigenvalues of Cayley graphs; Paley graphs; and Kazhdan constants. The book was written with undergraduate math majors in mind; indeed, several dozen of them field-tested it. The prerequisites are minimal: one course in linear algebra, and one course in group theory. No background in graph theory or representation theory is assumed; the book develops from scatch the required facts from these fields. The authors include not only overviews and quick capsule summaries of key concepts, but also details of potentially confusing lines of reasoning. The book contains ideas for student research projects (for capstone projects, REUs, etc.), exercises (both easy and hard), and extensive notes with references to the literature.

The theory of expander graphs is a rapidly developing topic in mathematics and computer science, with applications to communication networks, error-correcting codes, cryptography, complexity theory, and much more. Expander Families and Cayley Graphs: A Beginner's Guide is a comprehensive introduction to expander graphs, designed to act as a bridge between classroom study and active research in the field of expanders. It equips those with little or no prior knowledge with the skills necessary to both comprehend current research articles and begin their own research. Central to this book are four invariants that measure the quality of a Cayley graph as a communications network-the isoperimetric constant, the second-largest eigenvalue, the diameter, and the Kazhdan constant. The book poses and answers three core questions: How do these invariants relate to one another? How do they relate to subgroups and quotients? What are their optimal values/growth rates? Chapters cover topics such as: · Graph spectra · A Cheeger-Buser-type inequality for regular graphs · Group quotients and graph coverings · Subgroups and Schreier generators · Ramanujan graphs and the Alon-Boppana theorem · The zig-zag product and its relation to semidirect products of groups · Representation theory and eigenvalues of Cayley graphs · Kazhdan constants The only introductory text on this topic suitable for both undergraduate and graduate students, Expander Families and Cayley Graphs requires only one course in linear algebra and one in group theory. No background in graph theory or representation theory is assumed. Examples and practice problems with varying complexity are included, along with detailed notes on research articles that have appeared in the literature. Many chapters end with suggested research topics that are ideal for student projects.

Expander graphs are an important tool in theoretical computer science, geometric group theory, probability, and number theory. Furthermore, the techniques used to rigorously establish the expansion property of a graph draw from such diverse areas of mathematics as representation theory, algebraic geometry, and arithmetic combinatorics. This text focuses on the latter topic in the important case of Cayley graphs on finite groups of Lie type, developing tools such as Kazhdan's property (T), quasirandomness, product estimates, escape from subvarieties, and the Balog-Szemerédi-Gowers lemma. Applications to the affine sieve of Bourgain, Gamburd, and Sarnak are also given. The material is largely self-contained, with additional sections on the general theory of expanders, spectral theory, Lie theory, and the Lang-Weil bound, as well as numerous exercises and other optional material.

This new edition illustrates the power of linear algebra in the study of graphs. The emphasis on matrix techniques is greater than in other texts on algebraic graph theory. Important matrices associated with graphs (for example, incidence, adjacency and Laplacian matrices) are treated in detail. Presenting a useful overview of selected topics in algebraic graph theory, early chapters of the text focus on regular graphs, algebraic connectivity, the distance matrix of a tree, and its generalized version for arbitrary graphs, known as the resistance matrix. Coverage of later topics include Laplacian eigenvalues of threshold graphs, the positive definite completion problem and matrix games based on a graph. Such an extensive coverage of the subject area provides a welcome prompt for further exploration. The inclusion of exercises enables practical learning throughout the book. In the new edition, a new chapter is added on the line graph of a tree, while some results in Chapter 6 on Perron-Frobenius theory are reorganized. Whilst this book will be invaluable to students and researchers in graph theory and combinatorial matrix theory, it will also benefit readers in the sciences and engineering.

In the last ?fteen years two seemingly unrelated problems, one in computer science and the other in measure theory, were solved by amazingly similar techniques from representation theory and from analytic number theory. One problem is the - plicit construction of expanding graphs («expanders»). These are highly connected sparse graphs whose existence can be easily demonstrated but whose explicit c- struction turns out to be a dif?cult task. Since expanders serve as basic building blocks for various distributed networks, an explicit construction is highly des- able. The other problem is one posed by Ruziewicz about seventy years ago and studied by Banach [Ba]. It asks whether the Lebesgue measure is the only ?nitely additive measure of total measure one, de?ned on the Lebesgue subsets of the n-dimensional sphere and invariant under all rotations. The two problems seem, at ?rst glance, totally unrelated. It is therefore so- what surprising that both problems were solved using similar methods: initially, Kazhdan’s property (T) from representation theory of semi-simple Lie groups was applied in both cases to achieve partial results, and later on, both problems were solved using the (proved) Ramanujan conjecture from the theory of automorphic forms. The fact that representation theory and automorphic forms have anything to do with these problems is a surprise and a hint as well that the two questions are strongly related.

This book provides an introduction to hypergraphs, its aim being to overcome the lack of recent manuscripts on this theory. In the literature hypergraphs have many other names such as set systems and families of sets. This work presents the theory of hypergraphs in its most original aspects, while also introducing and assessing the latest concepts on hypergraphs. The variety of topics, their originality and novelty are intended to help readers better understand the hypergraphs in all their diversity in order to perceive their value and power as mathematical tools. This book will be a great asset to upper-level undergraduate and graduate students in computer science and mathematics. It has been the subject of an annual Master's course for many years, making it also ideally suited to Master's students in computer science, mathematics, bioinformatics, engineering, chemistry, and many other fields. It will also benefit scientists, engineers and anyone else who wants to understand hypergraphs theory.

Provides a comprehensive exploration of the main concepts and techniques from the young, exciting field of approximate groups.