Unfamiliarity with Graph Theory

Ten Chapters of a Book about 200 Years of Graph Theory 1736-1936 

The problem of the Konigsberg bridges Diagram-tracing puzzles Mazes and labyrinths 

The knight s tour Kirkman and polyhedra The Icosian Game 

The first studies of trees Counting unrooted trees Counting labeled trees 

Clifford, Sylvester, and the term graph Enumeration, from Cayley to Polya 

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For the chemist unfamiliar with graph theory a number of publicar tions cover its application to chemistry [S8-61]> such as enumeration of isomers, topdogy, organometallic chemistry, and polymers. A list of deii niUons collected by Essam and Fisher [62] provides a useful introduction to the terminology of graph theory. 

The degree of unfamiliarity of many chemists with graph theory appears widespread and can be illustrated with the lack of awareness that (i) graphs, despite that they can be drawn in an arbitrary manner, nevertheless have metric, (ii) graph identification is a nontrivial problem (iii) graph symmetry cannot be determined from their pictorial representations because graphs have no fixed geometry and can be represented in widely different ways. 

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