A Spectral Characterization for Concentration of the Cover Time

Abstract

We prove that for a sequence of finite vertex-transitive graphs of increasing sizes, the cover times are asymptotically concentrated if and only if the product of the spectral gap and the expected cover time diverges. In fact, we prove this for general reversible Markov chains under the much weaker assumption (than transitivity) that the maximal hitting time of a state is of the same order as the average hitting time.