Lower bounds for the isoperimetric numbers of random regular graphs

Abstract

The vertex isoperimetric number of a graph $G=(V,E)$ is the minimum of the ratio $|\partial_{V}U|/|U|$ where $U$ ranges over all nonempty subsets of $V$ with $|U|/|V|\le u$ and $\partial_{V}U$ is the set of all vertices adjacent to $U$ but not in $U$. The analogously defined edge isoperimetric number---with $\partial_{V}U$ replaced by $\partial_{E}U$, the set of all edges with exactly one endpoint in $U$---has been studied extensively. Here we study random regular graphs. For the case $u=1/2$, we give asymptotically almost sure lower bounds for the vertex isoperimetric number for all $d\ge3$. Moreover, we obtain a lower bound on the asymptotics as $d\to\infty$. We also provide asymptotically almost sure lower bounds on $|\partial_{E}U|/|U|$ in terms of an upper bound on the size of $U$ and analyse the bounds as $d\to\infty$.