The Local Structure of a Bipartite Distance-regular Graph

In this paper, we consider a bipartite distance-regular graph Γ = (X, E) with diameter d ≥ 3. We investigate the local structure ofΓ , focusing on those vertices with distance at most 2 from a given vertex x. To do this, we consider a subalgebra R = R(x) ofMat0307a0x.gif X(C), where 0307a1x.gifX denotes the set of vertices in X at distance 2 from x. R is generated by matrices Ã, 0307a2x.gif J, and 0307a3x.gif D defined as follows. For all y, z ∈ 0307a4x.gif X, the (y,z )-entry of à is 1 if y, z are at distance 2, and 0 otherwise. The (y, z)-entry of 0307a5x.gif J equals 1, and the (y,z )-entry of 0307a6x.gif D equals the number of vertices of X adjacent to each ofx , y, and z. We show that R is commutative and semisimple, with dimension at least 2. We assume thatdimR is one of 2, 3, or 4, and explore the combinatorial implications of this. We are motivated by the fact that if Γ has a Q-polynomial structure, thendimR ≤ 4.