The Sierpi\'{n}ski Domination Number

Abstract

Let $G$ and $H$ be graphs and let $f \colon V(G)\rightarrow V(H)$ be a function. The Sierpi\'{n}ski product of $G$ and $H$ with respect to $f$, denoted by $G \otimes _f H$, is defined as the graph on the vertex set $V(G)\times V(H)$, consisting of $|V(G)|$ copies of $H$; for every edge $gg'$ of $G$ there is an edge between copies $gH$ and $g'H$ of $H$ associated with the vertices $g$ and $g'$ of $G$, respectively, of the form $(g,f(g'))(g',f(g))$. In this paper, we define the Sierpi\'{n}ski domination number as the minimum of $\gamma(G\otimes _f H)$ over all functions $f \colon V(G)\rightarrow V(H)$. The upper Sierpi\'{n}ski domination number is defined analogously as the corresponding maximum. After establishing general upper and lower bounds, we determine the upper Sierpi\'{n}ski domination number of the Sierpi\'{n}ski product of two cycles, and determine the lower Sierpi\'{n}ski domination number of the Sierpi\'{n}ski product of two cycles in half of the cases and in the other half cases restrict it to two values.