A Short Proof for a Lower Bound on the Zero Forcing Number

Abstract

We provide a short proof of a conjecture of Davila and Kenter concerning a lower bound on the zero forcing number $Z(G)$ of a graph $G$. More specifically, we show that $Z(G)\geq (g-2)(\delta-2)+2$ for every graph $G$ of girth $g$ at least $3$ and minimum degree $\delta$ at least $2$.