Strong Fuzzy Chromatic Polynomial (SFCP) of Fuzzy Graphs and Some Fuzzy Graph Structures with Applications

Abstract

In fuzzy graph theory, strong arcs have separate importance. Assign different colors to the end nodes of strong arcs in the fuzzy graph is strong coloring. Strong coloring plays an important role in solving real-life problems that involve networks. In this work, we introduce the new concept, called strong fuzzy chromatic polynomial (SFCP) of a fuzzy graph based on strong coloring. The SFCP of a fuzzy graph counts the number of k-strong colorings of a fuzzy graph with k colors. The existing methods for determining the chromatic polynomial of the crisp graph are used to obtain SFCP of a fuzzy graph. We establish the necessary and sufficient condition for SFCP of a fuzzy graph to be the chromatic polynomial of its underlying crisp graph. Further, we study SFCP of some fuzzy graph structures, namely strong fuzzy graphs, complete fuzzy graphs, fuzzy cycles, and fuzzy trees. Besides, we obtain relations between SFCP and fuzzy chromatic polynomial of strong fuzzy graphs, complete fuzzy graphs, and fuzzy cycles. Finally, we present dual applications of the proposed work in the traffic flow problem. Once SFCP of a fuzzy graph is obtained, the proposed approach is simple enough and shortcut technique to solve strong coloring problems without using coloring algorithms.