TOPICS
Search

Tree Leaf


Leaves

A tree leaf of an unrooted tree is a node of vertex degree 1. Note that for a rooted or planted tree, the root vertex is generally not considered a leaf node, whereas all other nodes of vertex degree 1 are.

A function to return the leaves of a tree may be implemented in a future version of the Wolfram Language as LeafVertex[g].

The following table gives the total numbers of leaves for various classes of simple graphs and trees on n=1, 2, ... nodes. Unlabeled objects are counted up to graph isomorphism, with the root vertex preserved where present, and each leaf graph vertex is counted separately. Note that for rooted and planted trees, the root vertex is generally not counted as a leaf, even if it has vertex degree 1. For rooted trees with n>=2 nodes, these counts agree with OEIS A003227, whose first term counts the singleton graph as having one leaf. OEIS A003228 likewise counts one leaf at the singleton graph, while the convention here gives 0 in both cases. For planted trees with n>=2 nodes, OEIS A003227 is evaluated at n-1, because the additional root vertex adds one vertex to a rooted tree. At n=2, the root vertex of the old singleton graph becomes a nonroot leaf, so the first term of that sequence correctly gives 1. There is no planted tree with one graph vertex.

graph typeOEISleaf count for n=1, 2, ... nodes
graphA0555400, 2, 4, 14, 38, 153, 766, 6259, 88064, ...
labeled graphA0953380, 2, 12, 96, 1280, 30720, ...
labeled treeA0555410, 2, 6, 36, 320, 3750, ...
planted treeA0032270, 1, 1, 3, 8, 22, 58, 160, 434, 1204, 3341, 9363, ...
planted tree including root nodesA0953390, 2, 2, 5, 12, 31, 78, 208, 549, 1490, 4060, 11205, ...
rooted treeA0032270, 1, 3, 8, 22, 58, 160, 434, 1204, 3341, 9363, 26308, ...
rooted tree including degree-1 root nodesA0953370, 2, 4, 10, 26, 67, 180, 482, 1319, 3627, 10082, 28150, ...
treeA0032280, 2, 2, 5, 9, 21, 43, 101, ...

See also

Branch, Child, Fork, Maximum Leaf Number, Minimum Leaf Number, Root Vertex, Tree, Tree Height

Explore with Wolfram|Alpha

References

Robinson, R. W. and Schwenk, A. J. "The Distribution of Degrees in a Large Random Tree." Disc. Math. 12, 359-372, 1975.Slater, P. J. "Leaves of Trees." In Proceedings of the Sixth Southeastern Conference on Combinatorics, Graph Theory and Computing, (Utilitas Mathematics) (Ed. F. Hoffman et al. ) Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, pp. 549-559, 1975.Sloane, N. J. A. Sequences A003227/M2744, A003228/M0351, A055540, A055541, A095337, A095338, and A095339 in "The On-Line Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences."

Referenced on Wolfram|Alpha

Tree Leaf

Cite this as:

Weisstein, Eric W. "Tree Leaf." From MathWorld--A Wolfram Resource. https://mathworld.wolfram.com/TreeLeaf.html

Subject classifications