A046165 Number of minimal covers of n objects.

1, 1, 2, 8, 49, 462, 6424, 129425, 3731508, 152424420, 8780782707, 710389021036, 80610570275140, 12815915627480695, 2855758994821922882, 892194474524889501292, 391202163933291014701953, 240943718535427829240708786, 208683398342300491409959279244

Offset: 0

Author

Eric W. Weisstein

Keywords

• nonn

Comments

No edge of a minimal cover can be a subset of any other, so minimal covers are antichains, but the converse is not true. - Gus Wiseman, Jul 03 2019

a(n) is the number of undirected graphs on n nodes for which the intersection number and independence number are equal. See Proposition 2.3.7 and Theorem 2.3.3 of the Deligeorgaki et al. paper below. - Alex Markham, Oct 13 2022

Examples

			From _Gus Wiseman_, Jul 02 2019: (Start)
The a(1) = 1 through a(3) = 8 minimal covers:
  {{1}}  {{1,2}}    {{1,2,3}}
         {{1},{2}}  {{1},{2,3}}
                    {{2},{1,3}}
                    {{3},{1,2}}
                    {{1,2},{1,3}}
                    {{1,2},{2,3}}
                    {{1},{2},{3}}
                    {{1,3},{2,3}}
(End)
		

Links

• Alois P. Heinz, Table of n, a(n) for n = 0..113
• Damian Bursztyn, François Goasdoué, and Ioana Manolescu, Optimizing Reformulation-based Query Answering in RDF, [Research Report] RR-8646, INRIA Saclay. 2014.
• D. Deligeorgaki, A. Markham, P. Misra, and L. Solus, Combinatorial and algebraic perspectives on the marginal independence structure of Bayesian networks, arXiv:2210.00822 [stat.ME], 2022.
• Giovanni Resta, Illustration of a(4)=49.
• Eric Weisstein's World of Mathematics, Minimal Cover

Crossrefs

Cf. A035348, A000371, A003465.

Antichain covers are A006126.

Minimal covering simple graphs are A053530.

Maximal antichains are A326358.

Row sums of A035347 or of A282575.

Cf. A000372, A003182, A006602, A261005, A305844, A307249, A326359.

Programs

Maple

a:= n-> add(add((-1)^i* binomial(k,i) *(2^k-1-i)^n, i=0..k)/k!, k=0..n):
seq(a(n), n=0..20);  # Alois P. Heinz, Aug 19 2008

Mathematica

Table[Sum[Sum[Binomial[n,i]StirlingS2[i,k](2^k-k-1)^(n-i),{i,k,n}],{k,2,n}]+1,{n,1,20}] (* Geoffrey Critzer, Jun 27 2013 *)

Formula

E.g.f.: Sum_{n>=0} (exp(x)-1)^n*exp(x*(2^n-n-1))/n!. - Vladeta Jovovic, May 08 2004

a(n) = Sum_{k=1..n} Sum_{i=k..n} C(n,i)*Stirling2(i,k)*(2^k - k - 1)^(n - i). - Geoffrey Critzer, Jun 27 2013

a(n) ~ c * 2^(n^2/4 + n + 1/2) / sqrt(Pi*n), where c = JacobiTheta3(0,1/2) = EllipticTheta[3, 0, 1/2] = 2.1289368272118771586694585485449... if n is even, and c = JacobiTheta2(0,1/2) = EllipticTheta[2, 0, 1/2] = 2.1289312505130275585916134025753... if n is odd. - Vaclav Kotesovec, Mar 10 2014

Extensions

a(0)=1 prepended by Alois P. Heinz, Feb 18 2017