Local Irregularity Conjecture for 2-multigraphs versus cacti

Abstract

A multigraph is locally irregular if the degrees of the end-vertices of every multiedge are distinct. The locally irregular coloring is an edge coloring of a multigraph $G$ such that every color induces a locally irregular submultigraph of $G$. A locally irregular colorable multigraph $G$ is any multigraph which admits a locally irregular coloring. We denote by ${\rm lir}(G)$ the locally irregular chromatic index of a multigraph $G$, which is the smallest number of colors required in the locally irregular coloring of the locally irregular colorable multigraph $G$. In case of graphs the definitions are similar. The Local Irregularity Conjecture for 2-multigraphs claims that for every connected graph $G$, which is not isomorphic to $K_2$, multigraph $^2G$ obtained from $G$ by doubling each edge satisfies ${\rm lir}(^2G)\leq 2$. We show this conjecture for cacti. This class of graphs is important for the Local Irregularity Conjecture for 2-multigraphs and the Local Irregularity Conjecture which claims that every locally irregular colorable graph $G$ satisfies ${\rm lir}(G)\leq 3$. At the beginning it has been observed that all not locally irregular colorable graphs are cacti. Recently it has been proved that there is only one cactus which requires 4 colors for a locally irregular coloring and therefore the Local Irregularity Conjecture was disproved.