Unit Hypercube Visibility Numbers of Trees

Abstract

A visibility representation of a graph $G$ is an assignment of the vertices of $G$ to geometric objects such that vertices are adjacent if and only if their corresponding objects are "visible" each other, that is, there is an uninterrupted channel, usually axis-aligned, between them. Depending on the objects and definition of visibility used, not all graphs are visibility graphs. In such situations, one may be able to obtain a visibility representation of a graph $G$ by allowing vertices to be assigned to more than one object. The {\it visibility number} of a graph $G$ is the minimum $t$ such that $G$ has a representation in which each vertex is assigned to at most $t$ objects. In this paper, we explore visibility numbers of trees when the vertices are assigned to unit hypercubes in $\mathbb{R}^n$. We use two different models of visibility: when lines of sight can be parallel to any standard basis vector of $\mathbb{R}^n$, and when lines of sight are only parallel to the $n$th standard basis vector in $\mathbb{R}^n$. We establish relationships between these visibility models and their connection to trees with certain cubicity values.