Principal minors of effective-resistance matrices and local resistance radii

Mathematics > Combinatorics [Submitted on 16 Jun 2026] Title:Principal minors of effective-resistance matrices and local resistance radii View PDF HTML (experimental)Abstract:Let $G$ be a finite connected weighted graph and let $R$ be its effective-resistance matrix. For every nonempty vertex set $S$, we factor the cofactor sum and determinant of the principal resistance submatrix $R[S]$ into an enumerative term and a boundary potential-theoretic term. If $\tau(G)$ is the weighted spanning tree enumerator and $\kappa_G(S)$ is the weighted enumerator of $S$-rooted spanning forests, then \[ \cof R[S]=(-2)^{|S|-1}\kappa_G(S)/\tau(G). \] After Kron reduction to $S$, with reduced Laplacian $K=L^S$, $Q=K^+$, and $q=\diag(Q)$, the remaining normalized factor is \[ \det R[S]/\cof R[S] =\frac{2}{|S|}\tr Q+\frac12 q^{\mathsf T}Kq. \] Equivalently, this factor is the maximum of $u^{\mathsf T}R[S]u$ over all $u\in\R^S$ satisfying $\one^{\mathsf T}u=1$. This optimization viewpoint yields monotonicity under enlargement of $S$, an exact one-point update formula, and a support criterion for equality. Small star examples show that the resulting set function is neither submodular nor supermodular in general. References & Citations Loading... Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer (What is the Explorer?) Connected Papers (What is Connected Papers?) Litmaps (What is Litmaps?) scite Smart Citations (What are Smart Citations?) Code, Data and Media Associated with this Article alphaXiv (What is alphaXiv?) CatalyzeX Code Finder for Papers (What is CatalyzeX?) DagsHub (What is DagsHub?) Gotit.pub (What is GotitPub?) Hugging Face (What is Huggingface?) ScienceCast (What is ScienceCast?) Demos Recommenders and Search Tools Influence Flower (What are Influence Flowers?) CORE Recommender (What is CORE?) arXivLabs: experimental projects with community collaborators arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. Both individuals and organizations that work with arXivLabs have embraced and accepted our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners that adhere to them. Have an idea for a project that will add value for arXiv's community? Learn more about arXivLabs.