A graph is called star extremal if its fractional chromatic number is equal
to its circular chromatic number (also known as the star chromatic number)
. We prove that members of a certain family of circulant graphs are star ex
tremal. The result generalizes some known theorems of Sidorenko [Discrete M
ath., 91 (1991), pp. 215-217] and Gao and Zhu [Discrete Math., 152 (1996),
pp. 147-156]. We show relations between circulant graphs and distance graph
s and discuss their star extremality. Furthermore, we give counterexamples
to two conjectures of Collins [SIAM J. Discrete Math., 11 (1998), pp. 330-3
39] on asymptotic independence ratios of circulant graphs.