Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 November 2018
The thickness of a graph $G$ is the minimum number of planar subgraphs whose union is $G$. A $t$-minimal graph is a graph of thickness $t$ that contains no proper subgraph of thickness $t$. In this paper, upper and lower bounds are obtained for the thickness, $t\left( G\,\square \,H \right)$, of the Cartesian product of two graphs $G$ and $H$, in terms of the thickness $t\left( G \right)$ and $t\left( H \right)$. Furthermore, the thickness of the Cartesian product of two planar graphs and of a $t$-minimal graph and a planar graph are determined. By using a new planar decomposition of the complete bipartite graph ${{K}_{4k,\,4k}}$, the thickness of the Cartesian product of two complete bipartite graphs ${{K}_{n,n}}$ and ${{K}_{n,n}}$ is also given for $n\,\ne \,4k\,+\,1$.