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Finding general conditions which ensure that a graph is Hamiltonian is a central topic in graph theory. An old and well known conjecture in the area states that any $d$-regular $n$-vertex graph $G$ whose second largest eigenvalue in absolute value $\lambda(G)$ is at most $\frac{d}{C}$, for some universal constant $C>0$, has a Hamilton cycle. In this paper, we obtain two main results which make substantial progress towards this problem. Firstly, we settle this conjecture in full when the degree $d$ is at least a small power of $n$. Secondly, in the general case we show that $\lambda(G) \leq \frac{d}{C(\log n)^{1/3}}$ implies the existence of a Hamilton cycle, improving the 20-year old bound of $\frac{d}{ \log^{1-o(1)} n}$ of Krivelevich and Sudakov. We use in a novel way a variety of methods, such as a robust P\'osa rotation-extension technique, the Friedman-Pippenger tree embedding with rollbacks and the absorbing method, combined with additional tools and ideas. Our results have several interesting applications, giving best bounds on the number of generators which guarantee the Hamiltonicity of random Cayley graphs, which is an important partial case of the well known Hamiltonicity conjecture of Lov\'asz. They can also be used to improve a result of Alon and Bourgain on additive patterns in multiplicative subgroups.

Let $f^{(r)}(n;s,k)$ be the maximum number of edges of an $r$-uniform hypergraph on $n$ vertices not containing a subgraph with $k$ edges and at most $s$ vertices. In 1973, Brown, Erd\H{o}s and S\'os conjectured that the limit $$\lim_{n\to \infty} n^{-2} f^{(3)}(n;k+2,k)$$ exists for all $k$ and confirmed it for $k=2$. Recently, Glock showed this for $k=3$. We settle the next open case, $k=4$, by showing that $f^{(3)}(n;6,4)=\left(\frac{7}{36}+o(1)\right)n^2$ as $n\to\infty$. More generally, for all $k\in \{3,4\}$, $r\ge 3$ and $t\in [2,r-1]$, we compute the value of the limit $\lim_{n\to \infty} n^{-t}f^{(r)}(n;k(r-t)+t,k)$, which settles a problem of Shangguan and Tamo., Comment: 11 pages, 2 figures

For a hypergraph H$H$, define its intersection spectrum I(H)$I(H)$ as the set of all intersection sizes |E boolean AND F|$|E\cap F|$ of distinct edges E,F is an element of E(H)$E,F\in E(H)$. In their seminal paper from 1973 which introduced the local lemma, Erdos and Lovasz asked: how large must the intersection spectrum of a k$k$-uniform 3-chromatic intersecting hypergraph be? They showed that such a hypergraph must have at least three intersection sizes, and conjectured that the size of the intersection spectrum tends to infinity with k$k$. Despite the problem being reiterated several times over the years by Erdos and other researchers, the lower bound of three intersection sizes has remarkably withstood any improvement until now. In this paper, we prove the Erdos-Lovasz conjecture in a strong form by showing that there are at least k1/2-o(1)$k{1/2-o(1)}$ intersection sizes. Our proof consists of a delicate interplay between Ramsey-type arguments and a density increment approach., Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, 124 (5), ISSN:0024-6115, ISSN:1460-244X

An $n$-queens configuration is a placement of $n$ mutually non-attacking queens on an $n\times n$ chessboard. The $n$-queens completion problem, introduced by Nauck in 1850, is to decide whether a given partial configuration can be completed to an $n$-queens configuration. In this paper, we study an extremal aspect of this question, namely: how small must a partial configuration be so that a completion is always possible? We show that any placement of at most $n/60$ mutually non-attacking queens can be completed. We also provide partial configurations of roughly $n/4$ queens that cannot be completed, and formulate a number of interesting problems. Our proofs connect the queens problem to rainbow matchings in bipartite graphs and use probabilistic arguments together with linear programming duality., to appear in Research in the Mathematical Sciences

The MaxCut problem asks for the size mc(G of a largest cut in a graph G, It is well known that mc(G) >= m/2 for any m-edge graph G, and the difference mc(G) - m/2 is called the surplus of G. The study of the surplus of H-free graphs was initiated by Erdos and Lovasz in the 70s, who, in particular, asked what happens for triangle-free graphs. This was famously resolved by Alon, who showed that in the triangle-free case the surplus is Omega(m(4/5)), and found constructionsmatching this bound. We prove several new results in this area. i) Confirming a conjecture of Alon, Krivelevich and Sudakov, we show that for every fixed odd r >= 3, any C-r-free graph with m edges has surplus Omega(r) (mr+1/r+2). This is tight, as is shown by a construction of pseudo-random C-r-free graphs due to Alon and Kahale. It improves previous results of several researchers, and complements a result of Alon, Krivelevich and Sudakov which is the same bound when r is even. (ii) Generalising the result of Alon, we allow the graph to have triangles, and show that if the number of triangles is a bit less than in a random graph with the same density, then the graph has large surplus. For regular graphs, our bounds on the surplus are sharp. (iii) We prove that a n-vertex graph with few copies of K-r and average degree.. has surplus Omega(r) (d(r-1)/n(r-3) ),which is tight when.. is close to.. provided that a conjectured dense pseudo-random K-r-free graph exists. This result is used to improve the best known lower bound (as a function of m) on the surplus of K-r-free graphs. Our proofs combine techniques from semi-definite programming, probabilistic reasoning, as well as combinatorial and spectral arguments., Journal of the London Mathematical Society, ISSN:0024-6107, ISSN:1469-7750

We show that for $d\ge d_0(\epsilon)$, with high probability, the random graph $G(n,d/n)$ contains an induced path of length $(3/2-\epsilon)\frac{n}{d}\log d$. This improves a result obtained independently by Luczak and Suen in the early 90s, and answers a question of Fernandez de la Vega. Along the way, we generalize a recent result of Cooley, Dragani\'c, Kang and Sudakov who studied the analogous problem for induced matchings., Comment: 12 pages

This exposition contains a short and streamlined proof of the recent result of Kwan, Letzter, Sudakov and Tran that every triangle-free graph with minimum degree $d$ contains an induced bipartite subgraph with average degree $\Omega(\ln d/\ln\ln d)$., Comment: 3 pages

We prove a rainbow version of the blow-up lemma of Koml\'os, S\'ark\"ozy and Szemer\'edi for $\mu n$-bounded edge colourings. This enables the systematic study of rainbow embeddings of bounded degree spanning subgraphs. As one application, we show how our blow-up lemma can be used to transfer the bandwidth theorem of B\"ottcher, Schacht and Taraz to the rainbow setting. It can also be employed as a tool beyond the setting of $\mu n$-bounded edge colourings. Kim, K\"uhn, Kupavskii and Osthus exploit this to prove several rainbow decomposition results. Our proof methods include the strategy of an alternative proof of the blow-up lemma given by R\"odl and Ruci\'nski, the switching method, and the partial resampling algorithm developed by Harris and Srinivasan., Comment: 30 pages, included some recent applications

A famous theorem of Kirkman says that there exists a Steiner triple system of order $n$ if and only if $n\equiv 1,3\mod{6}$. In 1973, Erd\H{o}s conjectured that one can find so-called `sparse' Steiner triple systems. Roughly speaking, the aim is to have at most $j-3$ triples on every set of $j$ points, which would be best possible. (Triple systems with this sparseness property are also referred to as having high girth.) We prove this conjecture asymptotically by analysing a natural generalization of the triangle removal process. Our result also solves a problem posed by Lefmann, Phelps and R\"odl as well as Ellis and Linial in a strong form, and answers a question of Krivelevich, Kwan, Loh, and Sudakov. Moreover, we pose a conjecture which would generalize the Erd\H{o}s conjecture to Steiner systems with arbitrary parameters and provide some evidence for this., Comment: updated references, to appear in Combinatorica

We solve the existence problem for $F$-designs for arbitrary $r$-uniform hypergraphs~$F$. This implies that given any $r$-uniform hypergraph~$F$, the trivially necessary divisibility conditions are sufficient to guarantee a decomposition of any sufficiently large complete $r$-uniform hypergraph into edge-disjoint copies of~$F$, which answers a question asked e.g.~by Keevash. The graph case $r=2$ was proved by Wilson in 1975 and forms one of the cornerstones of design theory. The case when~$F$ is complete corresponds to the existence of block designs, a problem going back to the 19th century, which was recently settled by Keevash. In particular, our argument provides a new proof of the existence of block designs, based on iterative absorption (which employs purely probabilistic and combinatorial methods). Our main result concerns decompositions of hypergraphs whose clique distribution fulfills certain regularity constraints. Our argument allows us to employ a `regularity boosting' process which frequently enables us to satisfy these constraints even if the clique distribution of the original hypergraph does not satisfy them. This enables us to go significantly beyond the setting of quasirandom hypergraphs considered by Keevash. In particular, we obtain a resilience version and a decomposition result for hypergraphs of large minimum degree., This version combines the two manuscripts `The existence of designs via iterative absorption' (arXiv:1611.06827v1) and the subsequent `Hypergraph F-designs for arbitrary F' (arXiv:1706.01800) into a single paper, which will appear in the Memoirs of the AMS

Our motivation is the question of how similar the $f$-colouring problem is to the classic edge-colouring problem, particularly with regard to graph parameters. In 2010, Zhang, Yu, and Liu gave a new description of the $f$-matching polytope and derived a formula for the fractional $f$-chromatic index, stating that the fractional $f$-chromatic index equals the maximum of the fractional maximum $f$-degree and the fractional $f$-density. Unfortunately, this formula is incorrect. We present counterexamples for both the description of the $f$-matching polytope and the formula for the fractional $f$-chromatic index. Finally, we prove a short lemma concerning the generalization of Goldberg's conjecture.