The Sierpiński product of graphsKovič, Jurij (Avtor) Pisanski, Tomaž (Avtor) Zemljič, Sara Sabrina (Avtor) Žitnik, Arjana (Avtor) Sierpiński graphsgraph productsconnectivityplanaritysymmetryIn this paper we introduce a product-like operation that generalizes the construction of the generalized Sierpiński graphs. Let ▫$G, \, H$▫ be graphs and let ▫$f: V(G) \to V(H)$▫ be a function. Then the Sierpiński product of graphs ▫$G$▫ 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 ▫$\{g, g'\}$▫ of ▫$G▫$ there is an edge between copies ▫$gH$▫ and ▫$g'H$▫ of form ▫$\{(g, f(g'), (g', f(g))\}$▫. Some basic properties of the Sierpiński product are presented. In particular, we show that the graph ▫$G\otimes_f H$▫ is connected if and only if both graphs ▫$G$▫ and ▫$H$▫ are connected and we present some conditions that ▫$G, \, H$▫ must fulfill for ▫$G\otimes_f H$▫ to be planar. As for symmetry properties, we show which automorphisms of ▫$G$▫ and ▫$H$▫ extend to automorphisms of ▫$G\otimes_f H$▫. In several cases we can also describe the whole automorphism group of the graph ▫$G\otimes_f H$▫. Finally, we show how to extend the Sierpiński product to multiple factors in a natural way. By applying this operation ▫$n$▫ times to the same graph we obtain an alternative approach to the well-known ▫$n$▫-th generalized Sierpiński graph.20232023-11-06 09:31:13Neznano19869sl