On the Spectrum of Middle-Cubes

Abstract

A middle-cube is an induced subgraph consisting of nodes at the middle two layers of a hypercube. The middle-cubes are related to the well-known Revolving Door (Middle Levels) conjecture. We study the middle-cube graph by completely characterizing its spectrum. Specifically, we first present a simple proof of its spectrum utilizing the fact that the graph is related to Johnson graphs which are distance-regular graphs and whose eigenvalues can be computed using the association schemes. We then give a second proof from a pure graph theory point of view without using its distance regular property and the technique of association schemes.