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arXiv · 1606.02926

A counterexample to the reconstruction conjecture for locally finite trees

Nathan Bowler·Joshua Erde·Peter Heinig·Florian Lehner·Max Pitz
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Abstract

Two graphs $G$ and $H$ are hypomorphic if there exists a bijection $\varphi \colon V(G) \rightarrow V(H)$ such that $G - v \cong H - \varphi(v)$ for each $v \in V(G)$. A graph $G$ is reconstructible if $H \cong G$ for all $H$ hypomorphic to $G$. It is well known that not all infinite graphs are reconstructible. However, the Harary-Schwenk-Scott Conjecture from 1972 suggests that all locally finite trees are reconstructible. In this paper, we construct a counterexample to the Harary-Schwenk-Scott Conjecture. Our example also answers four other questions of Nash-Williams, Halin and Andreae on the reconstruction of infinite graphs.

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Nathan Bowler, Joshua Erde, Peter Heinig, Florian Lehner, Max Pitz. 2016-06-09. A counterexample to the reconstruction conjecture for locally finite trees. https://doi.org/10.1112/blms.12053

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