Free probability and representations of large symmetric groups
Piotr Sniady
备注：
This paper has been withdrawn by the author because preprints math.CO/0301299 and math.CO/0304275 were superceded by the paper math.CO/0411647 (Piotr Sniady, "Asymptotics of characters of symmetric groups, genus expansion and free probability". Discrete Math., 306 (7):624-665, 2006) which was created later by merging (and editing) these two preprints
We study the asymptotic behavior of the free cumulants (in the sense of free probability theory of Voiculescu) of Jucys--Murphy elements--or equivalently--of the transition measure associated with a Young diagram. We express these cumulants in terms of normalized characters of the appropriate representation of the symmetric group S_q. Our analysis considers the case when the Young diagrams rescaled by q^{-1/2} converge towards some prescribed shape. We find explicitly the second order asymptotic expansion and outline the algorithm which allows to find the asymptotic expansion of any order. As a corollary we obtain the second order asymptotic expansion of characters evaluated on cycles in terms of free cumulants, i.e. we find explicitly terms in Kerov polynomials with the appropriate degree.
We establish an isomorphism between the center of the Heisenberg category defined by Khovanov and the algebra $Λ^*$ of shifted symmetric functions defined by Okounkov-Olshanski. We give a graphical description of the shifted power and Schur bases of $Λ^*$ as elements of the center, and describe the curl generators of the center in the language of shifted symmetric functions. This latter description makes use of the transition and co-transition measures of Kerov and the noncommutative probability spaces of Biane.
Given an element in a finite-dimensional real vector space, $V$, that is a nonnegative linear combination of basis vectors for some basis $B$, we compute the probability that it is furthermore a nonnegative linear combination of basis vectors for a second basis, $A$. We then apply this general result to combinatorially compute the probability that a symmetric function is Schur-positive (recovering the recent result of Bergeron--Patrias--Reiner), $e$-positive or $h$-positive. Similarly we compute the probability that a quasisymmetric function is quasisymmetric Schur-positive or fundamental-posi…
We provide a classification of multiplicity-free inner tensor products of irreducible characters of symmetric groups, thus confirming a conjecture of Bessenrodt. Concurrently, we classify all multiplicity-free inner tensor products of skew characters of the symmetric groups. We also provide formulae for calculating the decomposition of these tensor products.
We determine all the multiplicity-free representations of the symmetric group. This project is motivated by a combinatorial problem involving systems of set-partitions with a specific pattern of intersection.
We consider random character values X(g) of the symmetric group on n symbols, where X is chosen at random from the set of irreducible characters and g is chosen at random from the group, and we show that X(g)=0 with probability tending to one as n tends to infinity.
Let $A$ be drawn uniformly at random from the set of all $n\times n$ symmetric matrices with entries in $\{-1,1\}$. We show that \[ \mathbb{P}( \det(A) = 0 ) \leq e^{-cn},\] where $c>0$ is an absolute constant, thereby resolving a well-known conjecture.
The convolution of indicators of two conjugacy classes on the symmetric group S_q is usually a complicated linear combination of indicators of many conjugacy classes. Similarly, a product of the moments of the Jucys--Murphy element involves many conjugacy classes with complicated coefficients. In this article we consider a combinatorial setup which allows us to manipulate such products easily: to each conjugacy class we associate a two-dimensional surface and the asymptotic properties of the conjugacy class depend only on the genus of the resulting surface. This construction closely resembles …
We introduce and study affine analogues of the fixed-point-free (FPF) involution Stanley symmetric functions of Hamaker, Marberg, and Pawlowski. Our methods use the theory of quasiparabolic sets introduced by Rains and Vazirani, and we prove that the subset of FPF-involutions is a quasiparabolic set for the affine symmetric group under conjugation. Using properties of quasiparabolic sets, we prove a transition formula for the affine FPF involution Stanley symmetric functions, analogous to Lascoux and Schützenberger's transition formula for Schubert polynomials. Our results suggest several conj…
We prove a Cauchy identity for free quasi-symmetric functions and apply it to the study of various bases. A free Weyl formula and a generalization of the splitting formula are also discussed.
This article is devoted to the study of several algebras which are related to symmetric functions, and which admit linear bases labelled by various combinatorial objects: permutations (free quasi-symmetric functions), standard Young tableaux (free symmetric functions) and packed integer matrices (matrix quasi-symmetric functions). Free quasi-symmetric functions provide a kind of noncommutative Frobenius characteristic for a certain category of modules over the 0-Hecke algebras. New examples of indecomposable $H_n(0)$-modules are discussed, and the homological properties of $H_n(0)$ are compute…
Union-free families of subsets of $[n]=\{1,... n\}$ have been studied in \cite{FF}. In this paper, we provide a complete characterization of maximal {\it symmetric difference}-free families of subsets of $[n]$.
Let $M_{n}$ denote a random symmetric $n\times n$ matrix, whose entries on and above the diagonal are i.i.d. Rademacher random variables (taking values $\pm 1$ with probability $1/2$ each). Resolving a conjecture of Vu, we prove that the permanent of $M_{n}$ has magnitude $n^{n/2+o(n)}$ with probability $1-o(1)$. Our result can also be extended to more general models of random matrices.
Let B(n) be the set of pairs of permutations from the symmetric group of degree n with a 3-cycle commutator, and let A(n) be the set of those pairs which generate the symmetric or the alternating group of degree n. We find effective formulas for calculating the cardinalities of both sets. More precisely, we show that #B(n)/n! is a discrete convolution of the partition function and a linear combination of divisor functions, while #A(n)/n! is the product of a polynomial and Jordan's totient function. In particular, it follows that the probability that a pair of random permutations with a 3-cycle…
Two celebrated conjectures in chromatic symmetric function theory concern the positivity chromatics symmetric functions of claw-free graphs. Here we extend the claw-free idea to general graphs and consider the e-positivity question for H-free graphs where H = {claw, F} and H={claw, F, co-F}, where F is a four-vertex graph. We settle the question for all cases except H={claw, co-diamond}, and we provide some partial results in that case.
Let $F_G(P)$ be a functional defined on the set of all the probability distributions on the vertex set of a graph $G$. We say that $G$ is \emph{symmetric with respect to $F_G(P)$} if the uniform distribution on $V(G)$ maximizes $F_G(P)$. Using the combinatorial definition of the entropy of a graph in terms of its vertex packing polytope and the relationship between the graph entropy and fractional chromatic number, we characterize all graphs which are symmetric with respect to graph entropy. We show that a graph is symmetric with respect to graph entropy if and only if its vertex set can be un…
We introduce analogues of the Hopf algebra of Free quasi-symmetric functions with bases labelled by colored permutations. As applications, we recover in a simple way the descent algebras associated with wreath products $Γ\wr\SG_n$ and the corresponding generalizations of quasi-symmetric functions. Also, we obtain Hopf algebras of colored parking functions, colored non-crossing partitions and parking functions of type $B$.
We consider a linear relation which expresses Stanley's chromatic symmetric function for a poset in terms of the chromatic symmetric functions of some closely related posets, which we call the modular law. By applying this in the context of (3+1)-free posets, we are able to reduce Stanley and Stembridge's conjecture that the chromatic symmetric functions of all (3+1)-free posets are e-positive to the case of (3+1)-and-(2+2)-free posets, also known as unit interval orders. In fact, our reduction can be pushed further to a much smaller class of posets, for which we have no satisfying characteriz…
Amit and Linial showed that a random lift of a graph with minimum degree $δ\ge3$ is asymptotically almost surely $δ$-connected, and mentioned the problem of estimating this probability as a function of the degree of the lift. We relate a randomly generated subgroup of the symmetric group on $n$ elements to random $n$-lifts of a graph and use it to provide such an estimate along with related results. We also improve their later result showing a lower bound on the edge expansion on random lifts. Our proofs rely on new ideas from group theory which make several improvements possible. We exactly c…
We introduce analogs of the Hopf algebra of Free quasi-symmetric functions with bases labelled by colored permutations. When the color set is a semigroup, an internal product can be introduced. This leads to the construction of generalized descent algebras associated with wreath products $Γ\wr\SG_n$ and to the corresponding generalizations of quasi-symmetric functions. The associated Hopf algebras appear as natural analogs of McMahon's multisymmetric functions. As a consequence, we obtain an internal product on ordinary multi-symmetric functions. We extend these constructions to Hopf algebras …
Let $M_n$ be drawn uniformly from all $\pm 1$ symmetric $n \times n$ matrices. We show that the probability that $M_n$ is singular is at most $\exp(-c(n\log n)^{1/2})$, which represents a natural barrier in recent approaches to this problem. In addition to improving on the best-known previous bound of Campos, Mattos, Morris and Morrison of $\exp(-c n^{1/2})$ on the singularity probability, our method is different and considerably simpler.
Let $M_n$ denote a random symmetric $n \times n$ matrix whose upper diagonal entries are independent and identically distributed Bernoulli random variables (which take values $1$ and $-1$ with probability $1/2$ each). It is widely conjectured that $M_n$ is singular with probability at most $(2+o(1))^{-n}$. On the other hand, the best known upper bound on the singularity probability of $M_n$, due to Vershynin (2011), is $2^{-n^c}$, for some unspecified small constant $c > 0$. This improves on a polynomial singularity bound due to Costello, Tao, and Vu (2005), and a bound of Nguyen (2011) showin…
An ordinal pattern for a finite sequence of real numbers is a permutation that records the relative positions in the sequence. For random walks with steps drawn uniformly from $[-1,1]$, we show an ordinal pattern occurs with probability $\frac{|[1,w]|}{2^n n!}$, where $[1,w]$ is a weak order interval in the affine Weyl group $\widetilde{A}_n$. For random walks with steps drawn from a symmetric Laplace distribution, the probability is $\frac{1}{2^n \prod_{j=1}^n \mathrm{lev}(π)_j}$, where $\mathrm{lev}(π)_j$ measures how often $j$ occurs between consecutive values in $π$. Permutations whose con…
In this note we describe the singular locus of diagonally-dominant Hermitian matrices with nonnegative diagonal entries over the reals, the complex numbers, and the quaternions. This yields explicit expressions for the probability that such matrices, chosen at random, are singular. For instance, in the case of the identity $n \times n$ matrix perturbed by a symmetric, zero-diagonal, $\{\pm 1/(n-1)\}$-Bernoulli matrix, this probability turns out to be equal to $2^{-(n-1)(n-2)/2}$. As a corollary, we find that the probability for a $n\times n$ symmetric $\{\pm 1\}$-Bernoulli matrix to have eigen…
Let $M_n$ denote a random symmetric $n$ by $n$ matrix, whose upper diagonal entries are iid Bernoulli random variables (which take value -1 and 1 with probability 1/2). Improving the earlier result by Costello, Tao and Vu, we show that $M_n$ is non-singular with probability $1-O(n^{-C})$ for any positive constant $C$. The proof uses an inverse Littlewood-Offord result for quadratic forms, which is of interest of its own.
We give a combinatorial formula for the inverses of the alternating sums of free quasi-symmetric functions of the form F_{ω(I)} where I runs over compositions with parts in a prescribed set C. This proves in particular three special cases (no restriction, even parts, and all parts equal to 2) which were conjectured by B. C. V. Ung in [Proc. FPSAC'98, Toronto].
In the rendezvous problem, two parties with different labelings of the vertices of a complete graph are trying to meet at some vertex at the same time. It is well-known that if the parties have predetermined roles, then the strategy where one of them waits at one vertex, while the other visits all $n$ vertices in random order is optimal, taking at most $n$ steps and averaging about $n/2$. Anderson and Weber considered the symmetric rendezvous problem, where both parties must use the same randomized strategy. They analyzed strategies where the parties repeatedly play the optimal asymmetric stra…
In this article we establish the asymptotic behavior of generating functions related to the exponential sum over finite fields of elementary symmetric functions and their perturbations. This asymptotic behavior allows us to calculate the probability generating function of the probability that the the elementary symmetric polynomial of degree $k$ and its perturbations returns $β\in \mathbb{F}_q$ where $\mathbb{F}_q$ represents the field of $q$ elements. Our study extends many of the results known for perturbations over the binary field to any finite field. In particular, we establish when a par…
We study the class $\mathcal{M}_{\mathrm{ratio}}$ of those probability distributions for which the free $R$-transforms are rational functions. This class is closed under the additive free convolution, additive free powers and under the monotone convolution. We prove a sufficient condition that a rational function is the free $R$-transform of a probability distribution. Several examples are provided, including that of free deconvolution.
A well-known conjecture states that a random symmetric $n \times n$ matrix with entries in $\{-1,1\}$ is singular with probability $Θ\big( n^2 2^{-n} \big)$. In this paper we prove that the probability of this event is at most $\exp\big( - Ω( \sqrt{n} ) \big)$, improving the best known bound of $\exp\big( - Ω( n^{1/4} \sqrt{\log n} ) \big)$, which was obtained recently by Ferber and Jain. The main new ingredient is an inverse Littlewood-Offord theorem in $\mathbb{Z}_p^n$ that applies under very mild conditions, whose statement is inspired by the method of hypergraph containers.
We propose a reformulation of some results known on the free dendriform dialgebra on one generator from a parenthesis point of view. This turns out to be more tractable and point out a connection to free probability by identifying noncrossing partitions with binary trees and by introducing the concept of NCP-operad.
Chessboard complexes and their relatives have been one of important recurring themes of topological combinatorics. Closely related ``cycle-free chessboard complexes'' have been recently introduced by Ault and Fiedorowicz as a tool for computing symmetric analogues of the cyclic homology of algebras. We study connectivity properties of these complexes and prove a result that confirms a strengthened conjecture of Ault and Fiedorowicz.
We present constructions of symmetric complete sum-free sets in general finite cyclic groups. It is shown that the relative sizes of the sets are dense in $[0,\frac{1}{3}]$, answering a question of Cameron, and that the number of those contained in the cyclic group of order $n$ is exponential in $n$. For primes $p$, we provide a full characterization of the symmetric complete sum-free subsets of $\mathbb{Z}_p$ of size at least $(\frac{1}{3}-c) \cdot p$, where $c>0$ is a universal constant.
We uncover the structure of the space of symmetric functions in non-commutative variables by showing that the underlined Hopf algebra is both free and co-free. We also introduce the Hopf algebra of quasi-symmetric functions in non-commutative variables and define the product and coproduct on the monomial basis of this space and show that this Hopf algebra is free and cofree. In the process of looking for bases which generate the space we define orders on the set partitions and set compositions which allow us to define bases which have simple and natural rules for the product of basis elements.
The goal of this paper is to analyse the asymptotic behavior of the cycle process and the total number of cycles of weighted and generalized weighted random permutations which are relevant models in physics and which extend the Ewens measure. We combine tools from combinatorics and complex analysis (e.g. singularity analysis of generating functions) to prove that under some analytic conditions (on relevant generating functions) the cycle process converges to a vector of independent Poisson variables and to establish a central limit theorem for the total number of cycles. Our methods allow us t…
We examine two associative products over the ring of symmetric functions related to the intransitive and Cartesian products of permutation groups. As an application, we give an enumeration of some Feynman type diagrams arising in Bender's QFT of partitions. We end by exploring possibilities to construct noncommutative analogues.
