Kekulé Structure of Angularly Connected Even Ring Systems

An even ring system G is a simple 2-connected plane graph with all interior vertices of degree 3, all exterior vertices of either degree 2 or 3, and all finite faces of an even length. G is angularly connected if all of the peripheral segments of G have odd lengths. In this paper, we show that every angularly connected even ring system G, which does not contain any triple of altogether-adjacent peripheral faces, has a perfect matching. This was achieved by finding an appropriate edge coloring of G, derived from the proof of the existence of a proper face 3-coloring of the graph. Additionally, an infinite family of graphs that are face 3-colorable has been identified. When interpreted in the context of the inner dual of G, this leads to the introduction of 3-colorable graphs containing cycles of lengths 4 and 6, which is a supplementation of some already known results. Finally, we have investigated the concept of the Clar structure and Clar set within the aforementioned family of graphs. We found that a Clar set of an angularly connected even ring system cannot in general be obtained by minimizing the cardinality of the set A. This result is in contrast to the previously known case for the subfamily of benzenoid systems, which admit a face 3-coloring. Our results open up avenues for further research into the properties of Clar and Fries sets of angularly connected even ring systems.