Some relations on the ordering of trees by minimal energies between subclasses of trees

The energy of a graph is defined as the sum of the absolute values of all eigenvalues of the graph. A tree is said to be non-starlike if it has at least two vertices with degree more than 2. A caterpillar is a tree in which a removal of all pendent vertices makes a path. Let $\mathcal{T}_{n,d}$, $\mathbb{T}_{n,p}$ be the set of all trees of order n with diameter d, p pendent vertices respectively. In this paper, we investigate the relations on the ordering of trees and non-starlike trees by minimal energies between $\mathcal{T}_{n,d}$ and $\mathbb{T}_{n,n-d+1}$. We first show that the first two trees (non-starlike trees, resp.) with minimal energies in $\mathcal{T}_{n,d}$ and $\mathbb{T}_{n,n-d+1}$ are the same for 3≤d≤n−2 (3≤d≤n−3, resp.). Then we obtain that the trees with third-minimal energy in $\mathcal{T}_{n,d}$ and $\mathbb{T}_{n,n-d+1}$ are the same when n≥11, 3≤d≤n−2 and d≠8; and the tree with third-minimal energy in $\mathcal{T}_{n,8}$ is the caterpillar with third-minimal energy in $\mathbb{T}_{n,n-7}$ for n≥11.