Theses and Dissertations

Issuing Body

Mississippi State University

Advisor

Neumann, Michael M.

Committee Member

Johnson, Corlis P.

Committee Member

Smith, Robert C.

Committee Member

Miller, Vivien G.

Committee Member

Miller, T. Len

Date of Degree

5-13-2006

Document Type

Dissertation - Open Access

Major

Mathematical Sciences

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Department of Mathematics and Statistics

Abstract

We study the existence of flows in infinite networks and extend basic theorems due to Gale and Hoffman and to Ford and Fulkerson. The classical approach to finite networks uses a constructive combinatorical algorithm that has become known as the labelling algorithm. Our approach to infinite networks involves Hahn--Banach type theorems on the existence of certain linear functionals. Thus the main tools are from the theory of functional and convex analysis. In Chapter II, we discuss sublinear and linear functionals on real vector spaces in the spirit of the work of K"{o}nig. In particular, a generalization of K"{o}nig's minimum theorem is established. Our theory leads to some useful interpolation results. We also establish a variant of the main interpolation theorem in the context of convex cones. We reformulate the results of Ford--Fulkerson and Gale--Hoffman in terms of certain additive and biadditive set functions. In Chapter III, we show that the space of all additive set functions may be canonically identified with the dual space of a space of certain step functions and that the space of all biadditive set functions may be identified with the dual space of a space of certain step functions in two variables. Our work an additive set functions is in the spirit of classical measure theory, while the case of biadditive set functions resembles the theory of product measures. In Chapter IV, we develop an extended version of the Gale--Hoffman theorem on the existence of flows in infinite networks in a setting of measure-theoretic flavor. This general flow theorem is one of our central results. We discuss, as an application of our flow theorem, a Ford--Fulkerson type result on maximal flows and minimal cuts in infinite networks containing sources and sinks. In addition, we present applications to flows in locally finite networks and to the existence of antisymmetric flows under certain natural conditions. We conclude with a discussion of the case of triadditive set functions. In the appendix, we review briefly the classical theory of maximal flows and minimal cuts in networks with finitely many nodes.

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11668/17314

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