Chromatic bases for symmetric functions

Abstract

In this note we obtain numerous new bases for the algebra of symmetric functions whose generators are chromatic symmetric functions. More precisely, if {Gk}k≥1 is a set of connected graphs such that Gk has k vertices for each k, then the set of all chromatic symmetric functions (formula presented) generates the algebra of symmetric functions. We also obtain explicit expressions for the generators arising from complete graphs, star graphs, path graphs and cycle graphs.