Ramsey and Turán numbers of sparse hypergraphs

Abstract

Degeneracy plays an important role in understanding Turán- and Ramsey-type properties of graphs. Unfortunately, the usual hypergraphical generalization of degeneracy fails to capture these properties. We define the skeletal degeneracy of a $k$-uniform hypergraph as the degeneracy of its $1$-skeleton (i.e., the graph formed by replacing every $k$-edge by a $k$-clique). We prove that skeletal degeneracy controls hypergraph Turán and Ramsey numbers in a similar manner to (graphical) degeneracy. Specifically, we show that $k$-uniform hypergraphs with bounded skeletal degeneracy have linear Ramsey number. This is the hypergraph analogue of the Burr-Erdős conjecture (proved by Lee). In addition, we give upper and lower bounds of the same shape for the Turán number of a $k$-uniform $k$-partite hypergraph in terms of its skeletal degeneracy. The proofs of both results use the technique of dependent random choice. In addition, the proof of our Ramsey result uses the `random greedy process' introduced by Lee in his resolution of the Burr-Erdős conjecture.

33 pages