Bounds on the lettericity of graphs

Abstract

Lettericity measures the minimum size of an alphabet needed to represent a graph as a letter graph, where vertices are encoded by letters, and edges are determined by an underlying decoder. We prove that all graphs on~$n$ vertices have lettericity at most approximately $n - \tfrac{1}{2} \log_2 n$ and that almost all graphs on $n$ vertices have lettericity at least $n - (2 \log_2 n + 2 \log_2 \log_2 n)$.