For a given permutation $π\in S_N$, Fulton proves that the matrix Schubert variety $\overline{X_π} \cong Y_π \times \mathbb{C}^q$ can be defined via certain rank conditions encoded in the Rothe diagram of $π$. In the case where $Y_π:=\text{TV}(σ_π)$ is toric (with respect to a $(\mathbb{C}^*)^{2N-1}$ action), we show that it can be described as an edge ideal of a bipartite graph $G^π$. We characterize the lower dimensional faces of the associated so-called edge cone $σ_π$ explicitly in terms of subgraphs of $G^π$ and present a combinatorial study for the first order deformations of $Y_π$. We prove that $Y_π$ is rigid if and only if the three-dimensional faces of $σ_π$ are all simplicial. Moreover, we reformulate this result in terms of Rothe diagram of $π$.
Given a matrix Schubert variety $\overline{X_π}$, it can be written as $\overline{X_π}=Y_π\times \mathbb{C}^q$ (where $q$ is maximal possible). We characterize when $Y_π$ is toric (with respect to a $(\mathbb{C}^*)^{2n-1}$-action) and study the associated polytope $Φ(\mathbb{P}(Y_π))$ of its projectivization. We construct regular triangulations of $Φ(\mathbb{P}(Y_π))$ which we show are geometric realizations of a family of subword complexes. Subword complexes were introduced by Knutson and Miller in 2004, who also showed that they are homeomorphic to balls or spheres and raised the question of…
This note constructs the flat toric degeneration of the manifold FL_n of flags in C^n from [Gonciulea-Lakshmibai 96] as an explicit GIT quotient of the Gr"obner degeneration in [Knutson-Miller 03]. This implies that Schubert varieties degenerate to reduced unions of toric varieties, associated to faces indexed by rc-graphs (reduced pipe dreams) in the Gel'fand-Cetlin polytope. Our explicit description of the toric degeneration of FL_n provides a simple explanation of how Gel'fand-Cetlin decompositions for irreducible polynomial representations of GL_n arise via geometric quantization.
We study a family of posets and the associated chain and order polytopes. We identify the order polytope as a maximal Kogan face in a Gelfand-Tsetlin polytope of a multiple of a fundamental weight. We show that the character of such a Kogan face equals to the character of a Demazure module which occurs in the irreducible representation of $\mathfrak{sl}_n$ having highest weight multiple of fundamental weight and for any such Demazure module there exists a corresponding poset and associated maximal Kogan face. We prove that the chain polytope parametrizes a monomial basis of the associated PBW-…
The theory of Newton-Okounkov polytopes is a generalization of that of Newton polytopes for toric varieties, and it gives a systematic method of constructing toric degenerations of a projective variety. In the case of Schubert varieties, their Newton-Okounkov polytopes are deeply connected with representation theory. Indeed, Littelmann's string polytopes and Nakashima-Zelevinsky's polyhedral realizations are obtained as Newton-Okounkov polytopes of Schubert varieties. In this paper, we apply the folding procedure to a Newton-Okounkov polytope of a Schubert variety, which relates Newton-Okounko…
We study certain faces of the normal polytope introduced by Feigin, Littelmann and the author whose lattice points parametrize a monomial basis of the PBW-degenerated of simple modules for $\mathfrak{sl}_{n+1}$. We show that lattice points in these faces parametrize monomial bases of PBW-degenerated Demazure modules associated to Weyl group elements satisfying a certain closure property, for example Kempf elements. These faces are again normal polytopes and their Minkowski sum is compatible with tensor products, which implies that we obtain flat degenerations of the corresponding Schubert vari…
We study the combinatorics of pseudoline arrangements and their relation to the geometry of flag and Schubert varieties. We associate to each pseudoline arrangement two polyhedral cones, defined in a dual manner. We prove that one of them is the weighted string cone by Littelmann and Berenstein-Zelevinsky. For the other we show how it arises in the framework of cluster varieties and mirror symmetry by Gross-Hacking-Keel-Kontsevich: for the flag variety the cone is the tropicalization of their superpotential while for Schubert varieties a restriction of the superpotential is necessary. We prove…
We will describe a one-step "Gorensteinization" process for a Schubert variety by blowing-up along its boundary divisor. The local question involves Kazhdan-Lusztig varieties which can be degenerated to affine toric schemes defined using the Stanley-Reisner ideal of a subword complex. The blow-up along the boundary in this toric case is in fact Gorenstein. We show that there exists a degeneration of the blow-up of the Kazhdan-Lusztig variety to this Gorenstein scheme, allowing us to extend this result to Schubert varieties in general. The potential use of this one-step Gorensteinization to des…
We classify smooth Schubert varieties S_0 in a rational homogeneous manifold S associated to a short root, and show that they are rigid in the sense that any subvariety of S having the same homology class as S_0 is induced by the action of Aut_0(S), unless S_0 is linear.
We consider smooth complete intersection Calabi-Yau 3-folds in minuscule Schubert varieties, and study their mirror symmetry by degenerating the ambient Schubert varieties to Hibi toric varieties. We list all possible Calabi-Yau 3-folds of this type up to deformation equivalences, and find a new example of smooth Calabi-Yau 3-folds of Picard number one; a complete intersection in a locally factorial Schubert variety ${\boldsymbolΣ}$ of the Cayley plane ${\mathbb{OP}}^2$. We calculate topological invariants and BPS numbers of this Calabi-Yau 3-fold and conjecture that it has a non-trivial Fouri…
Given a rational homogeneous manifold $S=G/P$ of Picard number one and a Schubert variety $S_0 $ of $S$, the pair $(S,S_0)$ is said to be homologically rigid if any subvariety of $S$ having the same homology class as $S_0$ must be a translate of $S_0$ by the automorphism group of $S$. The pair $(S,S_0)$ is said to be Schur rigid if any subvariety of $ S$ with homology class equal to a multiple of the homology class of $S_0$ must be a sum of translates of $S_0$. Earlier we completely determined homologically rigid pairs $(S,S_0)$ in case $S_0 $ is homogeneous and answered the same question in s…
For the toric variety X associated to the Bruhat poset of Schubert varieties in the Grassmannian, we describe the singular locus in terms of the faces of the associated polyhedral cone. We also determine the tangent cones at the maximal singularities of X. These turn out to be again toric varieties. In the case of X being associated to the Bruhat poset of Schubert varieties in the Grassmannian of 2-planes in a n-dimensional vector space (over the base field), we also prove a certain product formula relating the multiplicities at certain singular points.
Given a singular Schubert variety Z in a compact Hermitian symmetric space it is a longstanding question to determine when Z is homologous to a smooth variety Y. We identify those Schubert varieties for which there exist first-order obstructions to the existence of Y. This extends (independent) work of M. Walters, R. Bryant and J. Hong. Key tools include: (i) a new characterization of Schubert varieties that generalizes the well known description of the smooth Schubert varieties by connected sub-diagrams of a Dynkin diagram; and (ii) an algebraic Laplacian (a la Kostant), which is used to anal…
We discuss a characteristic free version of Frobenius splittings for toric varieties and give a polyhedral criterion for a toric variety to be diagonally split. We apply this criterion to show that section rings of nef line bundles on diagonally split toric varieties are normally presented and Koszul, and that Schubert varieties are not diagonally split in general.
We study the toric degeneration of Weyl group translated Schubert divisors of a partial flag variety of Lie type A via Gelfand-Cetlin polytopes. We propose a conjecture that Schubert varieties of appropriate dimensions intersect transversally up to translation by Weyl group elements, and verify it in various cases, including complex Grassmannian Gr(2, n) and complete flag variety Fl_4.
One can associate to a bipartite graph a so-called edge ring whose spectrum is an affine normal toric variety. We characterize the faces of the (edge) cone associated to this toric variety in terms of some independent sets of the bipartite graph. By applying to this characterization the combinatorial study of deformations of toric varieties by Altmann, we present certain criteria for their rigidity purely in terms of graphs.
For the toric variety X associated to the Bruhat poset of Schubert varieties in a minuscule G/P, we describe the singular locus in terms of the faces of the associated polyhedral cone. We further show that the singular locus is pure of codimension 3 in X.
Let X=G/P be cominuscule rational homogeneous variety. (Equivalently, X admits the structure of a compact Hermitian symmetric space.) We say a Schubert class [S] is Schur rigid if the only irreducible subvarieties Y of X with homology class [Y] = r [S], for an integer r, are Schubert varieties. Robles and The identified a sufficient condition for a Schubert class to be Schur rigid. In this paper we show that the condition is also necessary.
We study toric degenerations of opposite Schubert and Richardson varieties inside degenerations of Grassmannians and flag varieties. These degenerations are parametrized by matching fields in the sense of Sturmfels and Zelevinsky. We construct so-called restricted matching field ideals whose generating sets are understood combinatorially through tableaux. We determine when these ideals are toric and coincide with Gröbner degenerations of Richardson varieties using the well established standard monomial theory for Grassmannians and flag varieties.
In this paper we prove criteria for a nonnormal toric variety to be flexible, to be rigid and to be almost rigid. For rigid and almost rigid toric varieties we describe the automorphism group explicitly.
Let $G=SL(n, \mathbb{C}),$ and $T$ be a maximal torus of $G,$ where $n$ is a positive even integer. In this article, we study the GIT quotients of the Schubert varieties in the Grassmannian $G_{2,n}.$ We prove that the GIT quotients of the Richardson varieties in the minimal dimensional Schubert variety admitting stable points in $G_{2,n}$ are projective spaces. Further, we prove that the GIT quotients of certain Richardson varieties in $G_{2,n}$ are projective toric varieties. Also, we prove that the GIT quotients of the Schubert varieties in $G_{2,n}$ have at most finite set of singular poin…
In this thesis we study toric degenerations of projective varieties. We compare different constructions to understand how and why they are related as s first step towards developing a global framework. In focus are toric degenerations obtained from representation theory, tropical geometry and cluster algebras. Often those rely on valuations and the theory of Newton-Okounkov bodies. Toric degenerations can be seen as a combinatorial shadow of the original objects. The goal is therefore to understand why the different theories are so closely related, by understanding the toric degenerations they…
A Kazhdan-Lusztig atlas, introduced by He, Knutson and Lu, on a stratified variety (V,Y) is a way of modeling the stratification Y of V locally on the stratification of Kazhdan-Lusztig varieties X^w_o \cap X_v by their intersection with opposite Schubert varieties X_u. We are interested in classifying smooth toric surfaces with Kazhdan-Lusztig atlases. This involves finding a degeneration of V to a union of Richardson varieties in the flag variety H/B_H of some Kac-Moody group H. We determine which toric surfaces have a chance at having a Kazhdan-Lusztig atlas by looking at their moment polyto…
I construct a correspondence between the Schubert cycles on the variety of complete flags in C^n and some faces of the Gelfand-Zetlin polytope associated with the irreducible representation of SL_n(C) with a strictly dominant highest weight. The construction is based on a geometric presentation of Schubert cells by Bernstein-Gelfand-Gelfand using Demazure modules. The correspondence between the Schubert cycles and faces is then used to interpret the classical Chevalley formula in Schubert calculus in terms of the Gelfand-Zetlin polytopes. The whole picture resembles the picture for toric varie…
A dissection of a polygon is obtained by drawing diagonals such that no two diagonals intersect in their interiors. In this paper, we define a toric variety of Schröder type as a smooth toric variety associated with a polygon dissection. Toric varieties of Schröder type are Fano generalized Bott manifolds, and they are isomorphic if and only if the associated Schröder trees are the same as unordered rooted trees. We describe the cohomology ring of a toric variety of Schröder type using the associated Schröder tree and discuss the cohomological rigidity problem.
A classical tensegrity model consists of an embedded graph in a vector space with rigid bars representing edges, and an assignment of a stress to every edge such that at every vertex of the graph the stresses sum up to zero. The tensegrity frameworks have been recently extended from the two dimensional graph case to the multidimensional setting. We study the multidimensional tensegrities using tools from toric geometry. For a given rational tensegrity framework $\mathcal{F}$, we construct a glued toric surface $X_\mathcal{F}$. We show that the abelian group of tensegrities on $\mathcal{F}$ is …
I extend the definitions of schemes relative to monoids with zero - and therefore, toric geometry - to the world of formal schemes. This expands the usual framework to include, for instance, models for Mumford's degenerating Abelian varieties. Following the usual toric paradigm, normal formal monoid schemes can be classified in terms of certain cone complexes, and their properties understood in combinatorial terms. I use this to give a simple algebraisation criterion. I also reformulate the traditional notions of separated and proper morphism in a manner amenable to the context of relative for…
The maximal minors of a p by (m + p) matrix of univariate polynomials of degree n with indeterminate coefficients are themselves polynomials of degree np. The subalgebra generated by their coefficients is the coordinate ring of the quantum Grassmannian, a singular compactification of the space of rational curves of degree np in the Grassmannian of p-planes in (m + p)-space. These subalgebra generators are shown to form a sagbi basis. The resulting flat deformation from the quantum Grassmannian to a toric variety gives a new `Gröbner basis style' proof of the Ravi-Rosenthal-Wang formulas in qua…
