A Dirac type condition for properly coloured paths and cycles

Abstract

Let $c$ be an edge-colouring of a graph $G$ such that for every vertex $v$ there are at least $d\ge 2$ different colours on edges incident to $v$. We prove that $G$ contains a properly coloured path of length 2d or a properly coloured cycle of length at least $d+1$. Moreover, if $G$ does not contain any properly coloured cycle, then there exists a properly coloured path of length $3\times 2^{d-1}-2$.

includes minor revisions, accepted for publication in Jorunal of Graph Theory