On coefficients of the interior and exterior polynomials

Abstract

The interior polynomial and the exterior polynomial are generalizations of valuations on $(1/\xi,1)$ and $(1,1/\eta)$ of the Tutte polynomial $T_G(x,y)$ of graphs to hypergraphs, respectively. The pair of hypergraphs induced by a connected bipartite graph are abstract duals and are proved to have the same interior polynomial, but may have different exterior polynomials. The top of the HOMFLY polynomial of a special alternating link coincides with the interior polynomial of the pair of hypergraphs induced by the Seifert graph of the link. Let $G=(V\cup E, \varepsilon)$ be a connected bipartite graph. In this paper, we mainly study the coefficients of the interior and exterior polynomials. We prove that the interior polynomial of a connected bipartite graph is interpolating. We strengthen the known result on the degree of the interior polynomial for connected bipartite graphs with 2-vertex cuts in $V$ or $E$. We prove that interior polynomials for a family of balanced bipartite graphs are monic and the interior polynomial of any connected bipartite graph can be written as a linear combination of interior polynomials of connected balanced bipartite graphs. The exterior polynomial of a hypergraph is also proved to be interpolating. It is known that the coefficient of the linear term of the interior polynomial is the nullity of the bipartite graph, we obtain a `dual' result on the coefficient of the linear term of the exterior polynomial: if $G-e$ is connected for each $e\in E$, then the coefficient of the linear term of the exterior polynomial is $|V|-1$. Interior and exterior polynomials for some families of bipartite graphs are computed.