Dense flag triangulations of 3-manifolds via extremal graph theory

Abstract: We characterize f-vectors of sufficiently large three-dimensional flag Gorenstein* complexes, essentially confirming a conjecture of Gal [Discrete Comput. Geom., 34 (2), 269--284, 2005]. In particular, this characterizes f-vectors of large flag triangulations of the 3-sphere. Actually, our main result is more general and describes the structure of closed flag 3-manifolds which have many edges. Looking at the 1-skeleta of these manifolds we reduce the problem to a certain question in extremal graph theory. We then resolve this question by employing the Supersaturation Theorem of Erdos and Simonovits.