Small Snarks with Large Oddness

We estimate the minimum number of vertices of a cubic graph with given oddness and cyclic connectivity. We prove that a bridgeless cubic graph G with oddness ω(G) other than the Petersen graph has at least 5.41ω(G) vertices, and for each integer k with 2 6 k 6 6 we construct an infinite family of cubic graphs with cyclic connectivity k and small oddness ratio |V (G)|/ω(G). In particular, for cyclic connectivity 2, 4, 5, and 6 we improve the upper bounds on the oddness ratio of snarks to 7.5, 13, 25, and 99 from the known values 9, 15, 76, and 118, respectively. In addition, we construct a cyclically 4-connected snark of girth 5 with oddness 4 on 44 vertices, improving the best previous value of 46.