We introduce interpolation analogues of Schur Q-functions - the multiparameter Schur Q-functions. We obtain for them several results: a combinatorial formula, generating functions for one-row and two-rows functions, vanishing and characterization properties, a Pieri-type formula, a Nimmo-type formula (a relation of two Pfaffians), a Giambelli-Schur-type Pfaffian formula, a determinantal formula for the transition coefficients between multiparameter Schur Q-functions with different parameters. We write an explicit Pfaffian expression for the dimension of skew shifted Young diagram. This paper is a continuation of author's paper math.CO/0303169 and is a partial projective analogue of the paper by A. Okounkov and G. Olshanski q-alg/9605042, and of the paper by G. Olshanski, A. Regev and A. Vershik math.CO/0110077.
We investigate chromatic symmetric functions in the relation to the algebra $Γ$ of symmetric functions generated by Schur $Q$-functions. We construct natural bases of $Γ$ in terms of chromatic symmetric functions. We also consider the $p$-positivity of skew Schur $Q$-functions and find a class of $p$-positive ribbon Schur $Q$-functions, making a conjecture that they are \emph{all}. We include many concrete computational results that support our conjecture.
We exhibit a weight-preserving bijection between semi-standard Young tableaux and semi-skyline augmented fillings to provide a combinatorial proof that the Schur functions decompose into nonsymmetric functions indexed by compositions. The insertion procedure involved in the proof leads to an analogue of the Robinson-Schensted-Knuth Algorithm for semi-skyline augmented fillings. This procedure commutes with the RSK algorithm, and therefore retains many of its properties.
We introduce two families of symmetric functions generalizing the factorial Schur $P$- and $Q$- functions due to Ivanov. We call them $K$-theoretic analogues of factorial Schur $P$- and $Q$- functions. We prove various combinatorial expressions for these functions, e.g. as a ratio of Pfaffians, and a sum over excited Young diagrams. As a geometric application, we show that these functions represent the Schubert classes in the $K$-theory of torus equivariant coherent sheaves on the maximal isotropic Grassmannians of symplectic and orthogonal types. This generalizes a corresponding result for th…
We establish Pfaffian analogues of the Cauchy--Binet formula and the Ishikawa--Wakayama minor-summation formula. Each of these Pfaffian analogues expresses a sum of products of subpfaffians of two skew-symmetric matrices in terms of a single Pfaffian. By using these Pfaffian formulas we give new transparent proofs to several identities for Schur Q23 pa-functions.
We construct examples of nonnegative harmonic functions on certain graded graphs: the Young lattice and its generalizations. Such functions first emerged in harmonic analysis on the infinite symmetric group. Our method relies on multivariate interpolation polynomials associated with Schur's S and P functions and with Jack symmetric functions. As a by-product, we compute certain Selberg-type integrals.
In 2004 Rosas and Sagan asked whether there was a way to define a basis in the algebra of symmetric functions in noncommuting variables, NCSym, having properties analogous to the classical Schur functions. This was because they had constructed a partial such set that was not a basis. We answer their question by defining Schur functions in noncommuting variables using a noncommutative analogue of the Jacobi-Trudi determinant. Our Schur functions in NCSym map to classical Schur functions under commutation, and a subset of them indexed by set partitions forms a basis for NCSym. Amongst other prop…
We study pfaffian analogues of immanants, which we call pfaffinants. Our main object is the TL-pfaffinants which are analogues of Rhoades and Skandera's TL-immanants. We show that TL-pfaffinants are positive when applied to planar networks and explain how to decompose products of complementary pfaffians in terms of TL-pfaffinants. We conjecture in addition that TL-pfaffinants have positivity properties related to Schur Q-functions.
We present an identity which can be regarded as a Pfaffian-Hafnian analogue of Borchardt's identity and as a generalization of Schur's identity. We give a proof using the complex analysis.
We introduce and study a family of inhomogeneous symmetric functions which we call the Frobenius-Schur functions. These functions are indexed by partitions and differ from the conventional Schur functions in lower terms only. Our interest in these new functions comes from the fact that they provide an explicit expression for the dimension of a skew Young diagram in terms of the Frobenius coordinates. This is important for the asymptotic theory of the characters of the symmetric groups. Our main result is a surprisingly simple determinantal expression of the Frobenius-Schur functions in terms o…
In previous work with Mikhail Khovanov and Aaron Lauda we introduced two odd analogues of the Schur functions: one via the combinatorics of Young tableaux (odd Kostka numbers) and one via the odd symmetrization operator. In this paper we introduce a third analogue, the plactic Schur functions. We show they coincide with both previously defined types of Schur function, confirming a conjecture. Using the plactic definition, we establish an odd Littlewood-Richardson rule. We also re-cast this rule in the language of polytopes, via the Knutson-Tao hive model.
Schur-Weyl duality is a fundamental framework in combinatorial representation theory. It intimately relates the irreducible representations of a group to the irreducible representations of its centralizer algebra. We investigate the analog of Schur-Weyl duality for the group of unipotent upper triangular matrices over a finite field. In this case, the character theory of these upper triangular matrices is "wild" or unattainable. Thus we employ a generalization, known as supercharacter theory, that creates a striking variation on the character theory of the symmetric group with combinatorics bu…
We introduce a quasisymmetric generalization of Berele and Regev's hook Schur functions and prove that these new quasisymmetric hook Schur functions decompose the hook Schur functions in a natural way. We examine the combinatorics of the quasisymmetric hook Schur functions, providing a relationship to Gessel's fundamental quasisymmetric functions and an analogue of the Robinson-Schensted-Knuth algorithm. We also prove that the multiplication of quasisymmetric hook Schur functions with hook Schur functions behaves the same as the multiplication of quasisymmetric Schur functions with Schur funct…
We introduce non-commutative analogues of $k$-Schur functions of Lapointe-Lascoux and Morse. We give an explicit formulas for the expansions of non-commutive functions with one and two parameters in terms of these new functions. These results are similar to the conjectures existing in the commutative case.
We obtain a common generalization of two types of Sylvester formulas for compound determinants and its Pfaffian analogue. As applications, we give generalizations of the Giambelli identity to skew Schur functions and the Schur identity to Schur's skew $Q$-functions.
The classical Peter-Weyl theorem describes the structure of the space of functions on a semi-simple algebraic group. On the level of characters (in type A) this boils down to the Cauchy identity for the products of Schur polynomials. We formulate and prove the analogue of the Peter-Weyl theorem for the current groups. In particular, in type A the corresponding characters identity is governed by the Cauchy identity for the products of q-Whittaker functions. We also formulate and prove a version of the Schur-Weyl theorem for current groups. The link between the Peter-Weyl and Schur-Weyl theorems…
We consider the problem of embedding the semi-ring of Schur-positive symmetric polynomials into its analogue for the classical types $B/C/D$. If we preserve highest weights and add the additional Lie-theoretic parity assumption that the weights in images of Schur functions lie in a single translate of the root lattice, there are exactly two solutions. These naturally extend the Kirillov--Reshetikhin decompositions of representations of symplectic and orthogonal quantum affine algebras $U_q(\hat{g})$ (some still conjectural, some recently proven).
The present paper is a detailed version of math/0003031. We introduce and study a new basis in the algebra of symmetric functions. The elements of this basis are called the Frobenius-Schur functions (FS-functions, for short). Our main motivation for studying the FS-functions is the fact that they enter a formula expressing the combinatorial dimension of a skew Young diagram in terms of the Frobenius coordinates. This formula plays a key role in the asymptotic character theory of the symmetric groups. The FS-functions are inhomogeneous, and their top homogeneous components coincide with the con…
We prove the Murgnaghan--Nakayama rule for $k$-Schur functions of Lapointe and Morse, that is, we give an explicit formula for the expansion of the product of a power sum symmetric function and a $k$-Schur function in terms of $k$-Schur functions. This is proved using the noncommutative $k$-Schur functions in terms of the nilCoxeter algebra introduced by Lam and the affine analogue of noncommutative symmetric functions of Fomin and Greene.
We prove a Murnaghan-Nakayama rule for the noncommutative Schur functions introduced by Bessenrodt, Luoto and van Willigenburg. In other words, we give an explicit combinatorial formula for expanding the product of a noncommutative power sum symmetric function and a noncommutative Schur function in terms of noncommutative Schur functions. In direct analogy to the classical Murnaghan-Nakayama rule, the summands are computed using a noncommutative analogue of border strips, and have coefficients equal to 1 or -1 determined by the height of these border strips. The rule is proved by interpreting …
The involution Stanley symmetric functions $\hat{F}_y$ are the stable limits of the analogues of Schubert polynomials for the orbits of the orthogonal group in the flag variety. These symmetric functions are also generating functions for involution words, and are indexed by the involutions in the symmetric group. By construction each $\hat{F}_y$ is a sum of Stanley symmetric functions and therefore Schur positive. We prove the stronger fact that these power series are Schur $P$-positive. We give an algorithm to efficiently compute the decomposition of $\hat{F}_y$ into Schur $P$-summands, and p…
Schubert polynomials were discovered by A. Lascoux and M. Schützenberger in the study of cohomology rings of flag manifolds in 1980's. These polynomials generalize Schur polynomials, and form a linear basis of multivariate polynomials. In 2003, Lenart and Sottile introduced skew Schubert polynomials, which generalize skew Schur polynomials, and expand in the Schubert basis with the generalized Littlewood-Richardson coefficients. In this paper we initiate the study of these two families of polynomials from the perspective of computational complexity theory. We first observe that skew Schubert p…
We introduce a new operation on skew diagrams called composition of transpositions, and use it and a Jacobi-Trudi style formula to derive equalities on skew Schur Q-functions whose indexing shifted skew diagram is an ordinary skew diagram. When this skew diagram is a ribbon, we conjecture necessary and sufficient conditions for equality of ribbon Schur Q-functions. Moreover, we determine all relations between ribbon Schur Q-functions; show they supply a Z-basis for skew Schur Q-functions; assert their irreducibility; and show that the non-commutative analogue of ribbon Schur Q-functions is the…
We study the correlation functions of the Pfaffian Schur process. Borodin and Rains [J. Stat. Phys. 121 (2005), 291-317] introduced the Pfaffian Schur process and derived its correlation functions using a Pfaffian analogue of the Eynard-Mehta theorem. We present here an alternative derivation of the correlation functions using Macdonald difference operators.
Skew stable Grothendieck polynomials are $K$-theoretic analogues of skew Schur polynomials. We give a free-fermionic presentation of skew stable Grothendieck polynomials and their dual symmetric functions. By using our presentation, we derive a family of determinantal formulas, which are $K$-analogues of the Jacobi-Trudi formula for skew Schur functions. We also introduce a combinatorial method to calculate certain expansions of skew (dual) stable Grothendieck polynomials by using the non-commutative supersymmetric Schur functions.
We describe a combinatorial formula for the coefficients when the dual immaculate quasisymmetric functions are decomposed into Young quasisymmetric Schur functions. We prove this using an analogue of Schensted insertion. Using this result, we give necessary and sufficient conditions for a dual immaculate quasisymmetric function to be symmetric. Moreover, we show that the product of a Schur function and a dual immaculate quasisymmetric function expands positively in the Young quasisymmetric Schur basis. We also discuss the decomposition of the Young noncommutative Schur functions into the immac…
Classical Schur P-functions are the particular case of Hall-Littlewood polynomials when the parameter is equal to -1. We introduce factorial (interpolation) analogues of Schur P-functions. A dimension of a skew shifted Young diagram is the number of standard tableaux of the given shape. Also these numbers are equal up to simple factors to the decomposition coefficients of the restriction of an irreducible representation of a spin-symmetric group to a smaller spin-symmetric group. In terms of the factorial Schur P-functions we obtain an explicit formula for the dimension of a skew shifted Young…
The double Schur functions form a distinguished basis of the ring Λ(x||a) which is a multiparameter generalization of the ring of symmetric functions Λ(x). The canonical comultiplication on Λ(x) is extended to Λ(x||a) in a natural way so that the double power sums symmetric functions are primitive elements. We calculate the dual Littlewood-Richardson coefficients in two different ways thus providing comultiplication rules for the double Schur functions. We also prove multiparameter analogues of the Cauchy identity. A new family of Schur type functions plays the role of a dual object in the ide…
A new type of polynomial analogue of the Rogers-Ramanujan identities is proven. Here the product-side of the Rogers-Ramanujan identities is replaced by a partial theta sum and the sum-side by a weighted sum over Schur polynomials.
We give bijective proofs of orthosymplectic analogues of the Cauchy identity and dual Cauchy identity for orthosymplectic Schur functions. To do so, we present two insertion algorithms; these are orthosymplectic versions of Berele's symplectic insertion algorithms, which were used by Sundaram to give bijective proofs of Cauchy identities for symplectic Schur functions.
For any complex number $α$ and any even-size skew-symmetric matrix $B$, we define a generalization $\pfaα(B)$ of the pfaffian $\pf(B)$ which we call the $α$-pfaffian. The $α$-pfaffian is a pfaffian analogue of the $α$-determinant. It gives the pfaffian at $α=-1$. We give some formulas for $α$-pfaffians and study the positivity. Further we define point processes determined by the $α$-pfaffian. Also we provide a linear algebraic proof of the explicit pfaffian expression for the correlation function of the shifted Schur measure.
Recently a new basis for the Hopf algebra of quasisymmetric functions $QSym$, called quasisymmetric Schur functions, has been introduced by Haglund, Luoto, Mason, van Willigenburg. In this paper we extend the definition of quasisymmetric Schur functions to introduce skew quasisymmetric Schur functions. These functions include both classical skew Schur functions and quasisymmetric Schur functions as examples, and give rise to a new poset $\mathcal{L}_C$ that is analogous to Young's lattice. We also introduce a new basis for the Hopf algebra of noncommutative symmetric functions $NSym$. This bas…
Symmetric Grothendieck polynomials are analogues of Schur polynomials in the K-theory of Grassmannians. We build dual families of symmetric Grothendieck polynomials using Schur operators. With this approach we prove skew Cauchy identity and then derive various applications: skew Pieri rules, dual filtrations of Young's lattice, generating series and enumerative identities. We also give a new explanation of the finite expansion property for products of Grothendieck polynomials.
We define a new family of symmetric functions which are affine analogues of Stanley symmetric functions. We establish basic properties of these functions including symmetry, dominance and conjugation. We conjecture certain positivity properties in terms of a subfamily of symmetric functions called affine Schur functions. As applications, we show how affine Stanley symmetric functions generalise the (dual of the) $k$-Schur functions of Lapointe, Lascoux and Morse as well as the cylindric Schur functions of Postnikov. Conjecturally, affine Stanley symmetric functions should be related to the coh…
The celebrated hook-length formula gives a product formula for the number of standard Young tableaux of a straight shape. In 2014, Naruse announced a more general formula for the number of standard Young tableaux of skew shapes as a positive sum over excited diagrams of products of hook-lengths. We give an algebraic and a combinatorial proof of Naruse's formula, by using factorial Schur functions and a generalization of the Hillman--Grassl correspondence, respectively. The main new results are two different $q$-analogues of Naruse's formula: for the skew Schur functions, and for counting rever…
We establish a fundamental connection between the geometric RSK correspondence and GL(N,R)-Whittaker functions, analogous to the well known relationship between the RSK correspondence and Schur functions. This gives rise to a natural family of measures associated with GL(N,R)-Whittaker functions which are the analogues in this setting of the Schur measures on integer partitions. The corresponding analogue of the Cauchy-Littlewood identity can be seen as a generalisation of an integral identity for GL(N,R)-Whittaker functions due to Bump and Stade. As an application, we obtain an explicit integ…
We construct a family of BC_n-symmetric biorthogonal abelian functions generalizing Koornwinder's orthogonal polynomials, and prove a number of their properties, most notably analogues of Macdonald's conjectures. The construction is based on a direct construction for a special case generalizing Okounkov's interpolation polynomials. We show that these interpolation functions satisfy a collection of generalized hypergeometric identities, including new multivariate elliptic analogues of Jackson's summation and Bailey's transformation.
