Following Contou-Carrere [CC], we consider the Bott-Samelson resolution of a Schubert variety as a variety of galleries in the Tits building associated to the situation. We prove that the rational smoothness of a Schubert variety can be expressed in terms of a subspace of the Zariski tangent space called, the combinatorial tangent space. For this, we use a characterization of rational smoothness of a Schubert variety introduced by Carrell and Peterson [CP].
We consider tangent cones to Schubert subvarieties of the flag variety $G/B$, where $B$ is a Borel subgroup of a reductive complex algebraic group $G$ of type $E_6$, $E_7$ or $E_8$. We prove that if $w_1$ and $w_2$ form a good pair of involutions in the Weyl group $W$ of $G$ then the tangent cones $C_{w_1}$ and $C_{w_2}$ to the corresponding Schubert subvarieties of $G/B$ do not coincide as subschemes of the tangent space to $G/B$ at the neutral point.
We consider the action of the Levi subgroup of a parabolic subgroup that stabilizes a Schubert variety. We show that a smooth Schubert variety is a homogeneous space for a parabolic subgroup, or it has a smooth Schubert divisor. Further, we show that all smooth Schubert varieties in a (partial) flag variety of a rank two simple algebraic group are spherical.
Let $G$ be a complex reductive group, $T$ be a maximal torus of $G$, $B$ be a Borel subgroup of $G$ containing $T$, $W$ be the Weyl group of $G$ with respect to $T$. To each element $w$ of $W$ one can associate the Schubert subvariety $X_w$ of the flag variety $G/B$, the tangent cone to $X_w$ at the identity point $p$ considered as a subcheme of the tangent space $T_p(G/B)$, and the reduced tangent cone to $X_w$ at $p$ considered as a subvariety of $T_p(G/B)$. Let $w_1$, $w_2$ be distinct involutions in $W$. We prove that if $G$ is of type $B_n$ or $C_n$, then the tangent cones corresponding t…
Let $G$ be a complex reductive algebraic group, $T$ a maximal torus in $G$, $B$ a Borel subgroup of $G$ containing $T$, $W$ the Weyl group of $G$ with respect to $T$. Let $w$ be an element of $W$. Denote by $X_w$ the Schubert subvariety of the flag variety $G/B$ corresponding to $w$. Let $C_w$ be the tangent cone to $X_w$ at the point $p=eB$ (we consider $C_w$ as a subscheme of the tangent space to $G/B$ at $p$). In 2011, D.Yu. Eliseev and A.N. Panov computed all tangent cones for $G=SL(n)$, $n<6$. Using their computations, A.N. Panov formulated the following Conjecture: if $w$, $w'$ are disti…
Let G be a semi-simple algebraic group over the complex numbers, B a Borel subgroup of G, T a maximal torus in B and P a parabolic in G containing B. This paper deals with singularities of T-stable subvarieties of G/P. It turns out that under the restriction that G doesn't contain any G_2-factors, the key geometric invariant determining the singular T-fixed points of X is the linear span of the reduced tangent cone to X at a T-fixed point x provided the singularity is isolated. The goal of this paper is to describe this invariant at the maximal singular T-fixed points when X is a Schubert vari…
Tangent spaces to Schubert varieties of type A were characterized by Lakshmibai and Seshadri. This result was extended to the other classical types by Lakshmibai. We give a uniform characterization of tangent spaces to Schubert varieties in cominuscule G/P. Our results extend beyond cominuscule G/P; they describe the tangent space to any Schubert variety in G/B at a point xB, where x is a cominuscule Weyl group element in the sense of Peterson. Our results also give partial information about the tangent space to any Schubert variety at any point. Our method is to describe the tangent spaces of…
This paper studies the singularities of affine Schubert varieties in the affine Grassmannian (of type $\mathrm{A}^{(1)}_\ell$). For two classes of affine Schubert varieties, we determine the singular loci; and for one class, we also determine explicitly the tangent spaces at singular points. For a general affine Schubert variety, we give partial results on the singular locus.
We compute the initial ideals, with respect to certain conveniently chosen term orders, of ideals of tangent cones at torus fixed points to Schubert varieties in orthogonal Grassmannians. The initial ideals turn out to be square-free monomial ideals and therefore Stanley-Reisner face rings of simplicial complexes. We describe these complexes. The maximal faces of these complexes encode certain sets of non-intersecting lattice paths.
We give a complete list of smooth and rationally smooth normalized Schubert varieties in the twisted affine Grassmannian associated with a tamely ramified group and a special vertex of its Bruhat-Tits building. The particular case of the quasi-minuscule Schubert variety in the quasi-split but non-split form of ${\rm Spin}_8$ ("ramified triality") provides an input needed in the article by He-Pappas-Rapoport classifying Shimura varieties with good or semi-stable reduction.
The set of T-invariant curves in a Schubert variety through a T-fixed point is relatively easy to characterize in terms of its weights, but the tangent space is more difficult. We prove that the weights of the tangent space are contained in the rational cone generated by the weights of the T-invariant curves. In simply laced types, this remains true if "rational" is replaced by "integral". We also obtain conditions under which every weight of the tangent space is the weight of a T-invariant curve, as well as a smoothness criterion. The results rely on equivariant K-theory, as well as the study…
Let $G$ be a reductive complex algebraic group, $T$ a maximal torus of $G$, $B$ a Borel subgroup of $G$ containing $T$, $Φ$ the root system of $G$ w.r.t. $T$, $W$ the Weyl group of $Φ$. Denote by $\Fo = G/B$ the flag variety, by $X_w$ the Schubert subvariety of $\Fo$ associated with an element $w\in W$, and by $C_w$ the tangent cone to $X_w$ at the point $p = eB$. Then $C_w$ is a subscheme of the tangent space $T_pX_w\subseteq T_p\Fo$. Suppose $w$, $w'$ are distinct involutions in $W$. Using the so-called Kostant--Kumar polynomials, we show that if every irreducible component of $Φ$ is of type…
The aim of this article is to present a smoothness criterion for Schubert varieties in generalized flag manifolds $G/B$ in terms of patterns in root systems. We generalize Lakshmibai-Sandhya's well-known result that says that a Schubert variety in $SL(n)/B$ is smooth if and only if the corresponding permutation avoids the patterns 3412 and 4231. Our criterion is formulated uniformly in general Lie theoretic terms. We define a notion of pattern in Weyl group elements and show that a Schubert variety is smooth (or rationally smooth) if and only if the corresponding element of the Weyl group avoi…
In this paper, we consider the GIT quotients of Schubert varieties for the action of a maximal torus. We describe the minuscule Schubert varieties for which the semistable locus is contained in the smooth locus. As a consequence, we study the smoothness of torus quotients of Schubert varieties in the Grassmannian. We also prove that the torus quotient of any Schubert variety in the homogeneous space $SL(n, \mathbb C)/P$ is projectively normal with respect to the line bundle $\mathcal L_{α_0}$ and the quotient space is a projective space, where the line bundle $\mathcal L_{α_0}$ and the parabol…
We study the Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity of tangent cones of Schubert varieties. Conjectures about this statistic are presented; these are proved for the covexillary case. This builds on work of L. Li and the author on these tangent cones, as well as that of J. Rajchgot-Y. Ren-C. Robichaux-A. St. Dizier-A. Weigandt and J. Rajchgot-C. Robichaux-A. Weigandt on tableau rules for computing regularity of some matrix Schubert varieties.
We give a closed-form formula for the Hilbert function of the tangent cone at the identity of a Schubert variety X in the Grassmannian in both group theoretic and combinatorial terms. We also give a formula for the multiplicity of X at the identity, and a Grobner basis for the ideal defining the intersection of X with the opposite cell as a closed subvariety of the opposite cell. We give conjectures for the Hilbert function and multiplicity at points other than the identity.
We examine quadratic surfaces in 3-space that are tangent to nine given figures. These figures can be points, lines, planes or quadrics. The numbers of tangent quadrics were determined by Hermann Schubert in 1879. We study the associated systems of polynomial equations, also in the space of complete quadrics, and we solve them using certified numerical methods. Our aim is to show that Schubert's problems are fully real.
Schubert varieties in finite dimensional flag manifolds G/P are a well-studied family of projective varieties indexed by elements of the corresponding Weyl group W. In particular, there are many tests for smoothness and rational smoothness of these varieties. One key result due to Lakshmibai-Sandhya is that in type A the smooth Schubert varieties are precisely those that are indexed by permutations that avoid the patterns 4231 and 3412. Recently, there has been a flurry of research related to the infinite dimensional analogs of flag manifolds corresponding with G being a Kac-Moody group and W …
Let G be a complex semi-simple linear algebraic group without G_2 factors, B a Borel subgroup of G and T a maximal torus in B. The flag variety G/B is a projective G-homogeneous variety whose tangent space at the identity coset is isomorphic, as a B-module, to Lie(G)/Lie(B). Recall that if w is an element of the Weyl group W of the pair (G,T), the Schubert variety X(w) in G/B is by definition the closure of the Bruhat cell BwB. In this note we prove that X(w) is non-singular iff the following two conditions hold: 1) its Poincaré polynomial is palindromic and 2) the tangent space TE(X(w)) to th…
Smooth Schubert varieties in rational homogeneous manifolds of Picard number 1 are horospherical varieties. We characterize standard embeddings of smooth Schubert varieties in rational homogeneous manifolds of Picard number 1 by means of varieties of minimal rational tangents. In particular, we mainly consider nonhomogeneous smooth Schubert varieties in symplectic Grassmannians and in the 20-dimensional $F_4$-homogeneous manifold associated to a short simple root.
A (normal) variety is Gorenstein if it is Cohen-Macualay and its canonical sheaf is a line bundle. This property, which measures the ``pathology'' of the singularities of a variety, is thus stronger than Cohen-Macualayness, but is also weaker than smoothness. We determine which Schubert varieties are Gorenstein in terms of a combinatorial characterization using generalized pattern avoidance conditions. We also give an explicit description as a line bundle of the canonical sheaf of a Gorenstein Schubert variety.
Let $G$ be a simple, simply connected algebraic group over the field of complex numbers. We give a necessary and a sufficient condition for a Schubert variety $X(τ)$ for which all the higher cohomologies $H^{i}(X(τ), E)$ vanish for the restriction $E$ of the tangent bundle of $G/B$ to X(τ)$. We further show that the global sections $H^{0}(X(τ), E)$ is the adjoint representation of $G$ when $G$ is simply laced.
A Richardson variety $X_\ga^\gc$ in the Orthogonal Grassmannian is defined to be the intersection of a Schubert variety $X^\gc$ in the Orthogonal Grassmannian and a opposite Schubert variety $X_\ga$ therein. We give an explicit description of the initial ideal (with respect to certain conveniently chosen term order) for the ideal of the tangent cone at any $T$-fixed point of $X_\ga^\gc$, thus generalizing a result of Raghavan-Upadhyay \cite{Ra-Up2}. Our proof is based on a generalization of the Robinson-Schensted-Knuth (RSK) correspondence, which we call the Orthogonal bounded RSK (OBRSK). The…
Let X be a minuscule Schubert variety and $α$ a class of 1-cycle on X. In this article we describe the irreducible components of the scheme of morphisms of class $α$ from a rational curve to X. The irreducible components are described in the following way : the class $α$ can be seen as an element of $Pic(X)^*$ the dual of the Picard group. Because any Weil-divisor need not to be a Cartier-divisor, there is (only) a surjective map $s:A^1(X)^*\to Pic(X)^*$ from the dual of the group of codimension 1 cycles to the dual of the Picard group. The irreducible components are given by the effective ele…
With the help of Lusztig's canonical basis, we study local intersection cohomology of the Zariski closures of orbits of representations of a quiver of type A, D or E. In particular, we characterize the rationally smooth orbits and prove that orbit closures are smooth if and only if they are rationally smooth. This provides an analogue of theorems of V. Deodhar, and J. Carrell and D. Peterson on Schubert varieties.
In this paper we prove two results which further classify smoothness properties of Hilbert schemes of points. This is done by counting classes of arrows on Young diagrams corresponding to monomial ideals, building on the approach taken by Jan Cheah to show smoothness in the 2 dimensional case. We prove sufficient conditions for points to be smooth on Hilbert schemes of points in 3 dimensions and on nested schemes in 2 dimensions in terms of the geometry of the Young diagram. In particular, we proved that when the region between the two diagrams at a point of the nested scheme is rectangular, t…
We obtain new connections between permutation patterns and singularities of Schubert varieties, by giving a new characterization of Gorenstein varieties in terms of so called bivincular patterns. These are generalizations of classical patterns where conditions are placed on the location of an occurrence in a permutation, as well as on the values in the occurrence. This clarifies what happens when the requirement of smoothness is weakened to factoriality and further to Gorensteinness, extending work of Bousquet-Melou and Butler (2007), and Woo and Yong (2006). We also show how mesh patterns, in…
We study the equivariant oriented cohomology ring $h_T(G/P)$ of partial flag varieties using the moment map approach. We define the right Hecke action on this cohomology ring, and then prove that the respective Bott-Samelson classes in $h_{T}(G/P)$ can be obtained by applying this action to the fundamental class of the identity point, hence generalizing previously known results by Brion, Knutson, Peterson, Tymoczko and others. We then focus on the equivariant oriented cohomology theory corresponding to the 2-parameter Todd genus. We give a new interpretation of Deodhar's construction of the pa…
A subvariety of a complex projective space has a well-known dual variety, which is the set of its tangent hyperplanes. The purpose of this paper is to generalise this notion for a subvariety of a quite general partial flag variety. A similar biduality theorem is proved, and the dual varieties of Schubert varieties are described.
Let G be a semi-simple algebraic group over ${\mathbb C}$, B a Borel subgroup of G and T a maximal torus in B. A beautiful unpublished result of Dale Peterson says that if G is simply laced, then every rationally smooth point of a Schubert variety X in G/B is nonsingular in X. The purpose of this paper is to generalize this result to arbitrary T-stable subvarieties of G/B, the only restriction being that G contains no $G_2$ factors. In particular, we show that a Schubert variety X in such a G/B is nonsingular if and only if all the reduced tangent cones of X are linear.
The Richardson variety $X_w^v$ is defined to be the intersection of the Schubert variety $X_w$ and the opposite Schubert variety $X^v$. For $X_w^v$ in the Grassmannian, we obtain a standard monomial basis for the homogeneous coordinate ring of $X_w^v$. We use this basis first to prove the vanishing of $H^i(X_w^v,L^m)$, $i > 0 $, $m \geq 0$, where $L$ is the restriction to $X_w^v$ of the ample generator of the Picard group of the Grassmannian; then to determine a basis for the tangent space and a criterion for smoothness for $X_w^v$ at any $T$-fixed point $e_\t$; and finally to derive a recursi…
By the work of Breuil-Hellmann-Schraen, we know that the trianguline variety contains crystalline companion points which are parametrised by pairs (w,w_sat) of permutations. We first define and study a certain combinatorial property of a pair (w',w) of permutations, linked to the Bruhat order, in the context of Weyl groups of root systems. We call good pairs the pairs satisfying this property (which is the vast majority of pairs) and bad pairs the other ones. We then give an exact formula for the dimension of the tangent space to the trianguline variety at (generic) crystalline companion point…
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.
We prove a smoothness result for spaces of linear series with prescribed ramification on twice-marked elliptic curves. In characteristic 0, we then apply the Eisenbud-Harris theory of limit linear series to deduce a new proof of the Gieseker-Petri theorem, along with a generalization to spaces of linear series with prescribed ramification at up to two points. Our main calculation involves the intersection of two Schubert cycles in a Grassmannian associated to almost-transverse flags.
We give a simple geometric characterization of the locus where the inscribed Banach--Colmez Tangent Spaces of moduli of mixed characteristic local shtukas with one leg and fixed determinant are connected. We conjecture that the structure morphism for the underlying diamond is cohomologically smooth over this locus and, applying the Fargues--Scholze Jacobian criterion, we prove this conjecture in the case of EL infinite level Rapoport--Zink spaces, generalizing a result of Ivanov--Weinstein in the basic case.
In this expository paper we describe a powerful combinatorial formula and its implications in geometry, topology, and algebra. This formula first appeared in the appendix of a book by Andersen, Jantzen, and Soergel. Sara Billey discovered it independently five years later, and it played a prominent role in her work to evaluate certain polynomials closely related to Schubert polynomials. Billey's formula relates many pieces of Schubert calculus: the geometry of Schubert varieties, the action of the torus on the flag variety, combinatorial data about permutations, the cohomology of the flag vari…
Positroids are certain representable matroids originally studied by Postnikov in connection with the totally nonnegative Grassmannian and now used widely in algebraic combinatorics. The positroids give rise to determinantal equations defining positroid varieties as subvarieties of the Grassmannian variety. Rietsch, Knutson-Lam-Speyer and Pawlowski studied geometric and cohomological properties of these varieties. In this paper, we continue the study of the geometric properties of positroid varieties by establishing several equivalent conditions characterizing smooth positroid varieties using a…
Patch ideals encode neighbourhoods of a variety in GL_n/B. For Peterson varieties we determine generators for these ideals and show they are complete intersections, and thus Cohen-Macaulay and Gorenstein. Consequently, we combinatorially describe the singular locus of the Peterson variety; give an explicit equivariant K-theory localization formula; and extend some results of [B. Kostant '96] and of D. Peterson to intersections of Peterson varieties with Schubert varieties. We conjecture that the projectivized tangent cones are Cohen-Macaulay, and that their h-polynomials are nonnegative and up…
The regular \Z^r-covers of a finite cell complex X are parameterized by the Grassmannian of r-planes in H^1(X,\Q). Moving about this variety, and recording when the Betti numbers b_1,..., b_i of the corresponding covers are finite carves out certain subsets Ω^i_r(X) of the Grassmannian. We present here a method, essentially going back to Dwyer and Fried, for computing these sets in terms of the jump loci for homology with coefficients in rank 1 local systems on X. Using the exponential tangent cones to these jump loci, we show that each Ω-invariant is contained in the complement of a union of …
Let $G/P$ be a rational homogeneous space (not necessarily irreducible) and $x_0\in G/P$ be the point at which the isotropy group is $P$. The $G$-translates of the orbit $Qx_0$ of a parabolic subgroup $Q\subsetneq G$ such that $P\cap Q$ is parabolic are called $Q$-cycles. We established an extension theorem for local biholomorphisms on $G/P$ that map local pieces of $Q$-cycles into $Q$-cycles. We showed that such maps extend to global biholomorphisms of $G/P$ if $G/P$ is $Q$-cycle-connected, or equivalently, if there does not exist a non-trivial parabolic subgroup containing $P$ and $Q$. Then …
