Graphlike families of multiweights

Abstract

Let ${\cal G}=(G,w)$ be a weighted graph , that is, a graph $G$ endowed with a function $w$ from the edge set of $G$ to the set of real numbers; for any subset $S$ of the vertex set of $G$, we define $D_S({\cal G})$ to be the minimum of the weights of the subgraphs of $G$ whose vertex set contains $S$; we call $D_S({\cal G})$ a multiweight of ${\cal G}$. Let $X$ be a finite set and let $\{D_S\}_{S \subset X, \; \sharp S \geq 2} $ be a family of positive real numbers. We find necessary and sufficient conditions for the family to be the family of multiweights of a positive-weighted graph with vertex set $X$. Moreover we study the analogous problem for trees. Finally, we find a criterion to say if there exists a nonnegative-weighted tree ${\cal T}$ with leaf set $X$ and such that $D_S ({\cal T})=D_S $ for any $S \subset X$.