Counting Unlabeled Bipartite Graphs Using Polya's Theorem

Abstract

This paper solves a problem that was stated by M. A. Harrison in 1973. The problem has remained open since then, and it is concerned with counting equivalence classes of $n\times r$ binary matrices under row and column permutations. Let $I$ and $O$ denote two sets of vertices, where $I\cap O =\emptyset$, $|I| = n$, $|O| = r$, and $B_u(n,r)$ denote the set of unlabeled graphs whose edges connect vertices in $I$ and $O$. Harrison established that the number of equivalence classes of $n\times r$ binary matrices is equal to the number of unlabeled graphs in $B_u(n,r).$ He also computed the number of such matrices (hence such graphs) for small values of $n$ and $r$ without providing an asymptotic formula for $|B_u(n,r)|.$ Here, such an asymptotic formula is provided by proving the following two-sided inequality using Polya's Counting Theorem. \begin{equation} \displaystyle \frac{\binom{r+2^{n}-1}{r}}{n!} \le |B_u(n,r)| \le 2\frac{\binom{r+2^{n}-1}{r}}{n!}, n< r. \end{equation}