Csikvári's poset and Tutte polynomial

Changxin Ding

Published 2024-05-15Version 1

Csikv\'{a}ri constructed a poset on trees to prove that several graph functions attain extreme values at the star and the path among the trees on a fixed number of vertices. Reiner and Smith proved that the Tutte polynomials $T(1,y)$ of cones over trees, which are the graphs obtained by attaching a cone vertex to a tree, have the described extreme behavior. They further conjectured that the result can be strengthened in terms of Csikv\'{a}ri's poset. We solve this conjecture affirmatively.