Orienting transversals and transition polynomials of multimatroids

Abstract

Multimatroids generalize matroids, delta-matroids, and isotropic systems, and transition polynomials of multimatroids subsume various polynomials for these latter combinatorial structures, such as the interlace polynomial and the Tutte–Martin polynomial.We prove evaluations of the Tutte–Martin polynomial of isotropic systems from Bouchet directly and more efficiently in the context of transition polynomials of multimatroids. Moreover, we generalize some related evaluations of the transition polynomial of 4-regular graphs from Jaeger to multimatroids. These evaluations are obtained in a uniform and matroid-theoretic way. We also translate the evaluations in terms of the interlace polynomial of graphs. Finally, we give an excluded-minor theorem for the class of binary tight 3-matroids (a subclass of multimatroids) based on the excluded-minor theorem for the class of binary delta-matroids from Bouchet.