Exact solution of the hypergraph Tur\'an problem for $k$-uniform linear paths

Abstract

A $k$-uniform linear path of length $\ell$, denoted by $P^{(k)}_\ell$, is a family of $k$-sets $\{F_1,..., F_\ell\}$ such that $|F_i\cap F_{i+1}|=1$ for each $i$ and $F_i\cap F_j=\emptyset$ whenever $|i-j|>1$. Given a $k$-uniform hypergraph $H$ and a positive integer $n$, the {\it $k$-uniform hypergraph Tur\'an number} of $H$, denoted by $\ex_k(n,H)$, is the maximum number of edges in a $k$-uniform hypergraph $\cF$ on $n$ vertices that does not contain $H$ as a subhypergraph. With an intensive use of the delta-system method, we determine $\ex_k(n,P^{(k)}_\ell)$ exactly for all fixed $\ell\geq 1, k\geq 4$, and sufficiently large $n$. We show that $$\ex_k(n,P^{(k)}_{2t+1})={n-1\choose k-1}+{n-2\choose k-1}+...+{n-t\choose k-1}.$$ The only extremal family consists of all the $k$-sets in $[n]$ that meet some fixed set of $t$ vertices. We also show that $$\ex(n, P^{(k)}_{2t+2})={n-1\choose k-1}+{n-2\choose k-1}+...+{n-t\choose k-1}+{n-t-2\choose k-2},$$ and describe the unique extremal family. Stability results on these bounds and some related results are also established.