[Math] Hobbled rook tour – Hamiltonian cycle on square grid

co.combinatoricsgraph theoryhamiltonian-graphs

Consider a square grid of even side length ($2n \times 2n$). It is easy to see that there must exist a Hamiltonian cycle on the corresponding grid graph. Such a cycle is called balanced if the number of vertical edges equals the number of horizontal edges. It is easy to construct balanced Hamiltonian cycles for odd $n$. But for even $n$ I could not construct such balanced cycles nor can I prove that those cycles don't exist. Question: Does there exist a balanced Hamiltonian cycle on the grid for even $n$?

Curiously I could not find a lot of research material on this, despite it being quite a natural object. it is sometimes called a meander, for example, at Meanders filling out an $n$-by-$k$ grid, not reduced for symmetry.

There is also an article that characterize and enumerate (by an algorithm) these cycles:
Stoyan and Strehl – Enumeration of Hamiltonian Circuits in Rectangular Grids.

The cycle divides the squares grid into regions (and closes one of them), and all the regions are tree (no cycle of squares that share edge). I feel that the answer to the original question will come from a clever insight into those trees.

Edit: I've made changes to make it more appropriate for MO.

Best Answer

Only a longer comment, not a complete answer.

I think of a $2n \times 2n$ chess board, where paths connect midpoints of squares. Let the total area of the board be $2n \times 2n$. Then the closed region (the tree), encloses an area of independent of the cycle, namely $2n^2-1$.

I have not proved this, but it seems straightforward to prove that trees with certain properties, and Hamiltonian cycles are in bijection.

When $n$ is odd, we can make a rotationally-symmetric tree, (where each of the four arm is a spiral, for example) and thus constructing a balanced path, since there is center vertex for the tree, so the $2n^2-2$ (which is divisible by $4$), can be distributed evenly in the four quadrants.

If $n$ is even, we still can put one vertex of the tree in the middle, but the $2n^2-2$ is now not divisible by $4$, and I believe this can be exploited to somehow show that said circuit is impossible.

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