The Ehrhart polynomial of a convex lattice polytope counts integer points in integral dilates of the polytope. We present new linear inequalities satisfied by the coefficients of Ehrhart polynomials and relate them to known inequalities. We also investigate the roots of Ehrhart polynomials. We prove that for fixed d, there exists a bounded region of C containing all roots of Ehrhart polynomials of d-polytopes, and that all real roots of these polynomials lie in [-d, [d/2]). In contrast, we prove that when the dimension d is not fixed the positive real roots can be arbitrarily large. We finish with an experimental investigation of the Ehrhart polynomials of cyclic polytopes and 0/1-polytopes.
In this paper, we study the Ehrhart polynomial of the dual of the root polytope of type C of dimension $d$, denoted by $C_d^*$. We prove that the roots of the Ehrhart polynomial of $C_d^*$ have the same real part $-1/2$, and we also prove that the Ehrhart polynomials of $C_d^*$ for $d=1,2,\cdots$ has the interlacing property.
An outstanding conjecture on roots of Ehrhart polynomials says that all roots $α$ of the Ehrhart polynomial of an integral convex polytope of dimension $d$ satisfy $-d \leq \Re(α) \leq d-1$. In this paper, we suggest some counterexamples of this conjecture.
The conjecture on roots of Ehrhart polynomials, stated by Matsui et al. \cite[Conjecture 4.10]{MHNOH}, says that all roots $α$ of the Ehrhart polynomial of a Gorenstein Fano polytope of dimension $d$ satisfy $-\frac{d}{2} \leq \Re(α) \leq \frac{d}{2} -1$. In this paper, we observe the behaviors of roots of SSNN polynomials which are a wider class of the polynomials containing all the Ehrhart polynomials of Gorenstein Fano polytopes. As a result, we verify that this conjecture is true when the roots are real numbers or when $d \leq 5$.
The Ehrhart polynomial of the $d$-th hypersimplex $Δ(d,n)$ of order $n$ is studied. By computational experiments and a known result for $d=2$, we conjecture that the real part of every roots of the Ehrhart polynomial of $Δ(d,n)$ is negative and larger than $- \frac{n}{d}$ if $n \geq 2d$. In this paper, we show that the conjecture is true when $d=3$ and that every root $a$ of the Ehrhart polynomial of $Δ(d,n)$ satisfies $-\frac{n}{d} < {\rm Re} (a) < 1$ if $4 \leq d \ll n$.
V. Golyshev conjectured that for any smooth polytope P of dimension at most five, the roots $z\in\C$ of the Ehrhart polynomial for P have real part equal to -1/2. An elementary proof is given, and in each dimension the roots are described explicitly. We also present examples which demonstrate that this result cannot be extended to dimension six.
M. Beck, J. De Loera, M. Develin, J. Pfeifle and R. Stanley found that the roots of the Ehrhart polynomial of a d-dimensional lattice polytope are bounded above in norm by 1+(d+1)!. We provide an improved bound which is quadratic in d and applies to a larger family of polynomials.
Several polytopes arise from finite graphs. For edge and symmetric edge polytopes, in particular, exhaustive computation of the Ehrhart polynomials not merely supports the conjecture of Beck {\it et al.}\ that all roots $α$ of Ehrhart polynomials of polytopes of dimension $D$ satisfy $-D \le \Re(α) \le D - 1$, but also reveals some interesting phenomena for each type of polytope. Here we present two new conjectures: (1) the roots of the Ehrhart polynomial of an edge polytope for a complete multipartite graph of order $d$ lie in the circle $|z+\tfrac{d}{4}| \le \tfrac{d}{4}$ or are negative int…
Given arbitrary integers $k$ and $d$ with $0 \leq 2k \leq d$, we construct a Gorenstein Fano polytope $\Pc \subset \RR^d$ of dimension $d$ such that (i) its Ehrhart polynomial $i(\Pc, n)$ possesses $d$ distinct roots; (ii) $i(\Pc, n)$ possesses exactly $2k$ imaginary roots; (iii) $i(\Pc, n)$ possesses exactly $d - 2k$ real roots; (iv) the real part of each of the imaginary roots is equal to $- 1 / 2$; (v) all of the real roots belong to the open interval $(-1, 0)$.
Stanley's non-negativity theorem is at the heart of many of the results in Ehrhart theory. In this paper, we analyze the root behavior of general polynomials satisfying the conditions of Stanley's theorem and compare this to the known root behavior of Ehrhart polynomials. We provide a possible counterexample to a conjecture of the second author, M. Beck, J. De Loera, J. Pfeifle, and R. Stanley, and contribute some experimental data as well.
The symmetric edge polytopes of odd cycles (del Pezzo polytopes) are known as smooth Fano polytopes. In this paper, we show that if the length of the cycle is 127, then the Ehrhart polynomial has a root whose real part is greater than the dimension. As a result, we have a smooth Fano polytope that is a counterexample to the two conjectures on the roots of Ehrhart polynomials.
In earlier work in collaboration with Pavel Galashin and Thomas McConville we introduced a version of chip-firing for root systems. Our investigation of root system chip-firing led us to define certain polynomials analogous to Ehrhart polynomials of lattice polytopes, which we termed the symmetric and truncated Ehrhart-like polynomials. We conjectured that these polynomials have nonnegative integer coefficients. Here we affirm "half" of this positivity conjecture by providing a positive, combinatorial formula for the coefficients of the symmetric Ehrhart-like polynomials. This formula depends …
In this paper, we study the root distributions of Ehrhart polynomials of free sums of certain reflexive polytopes. We investigate cases where the roots of the Ehrhart polynomials of the free sums of $A_d^\vee$'s or $A_d$'s lie on the canonical line $\mathrm{Re}(z)=-\frac{1}{2}$ on the complex plane $\mathbb{C}$, where $A_d$ denotes the root polytope of type A of dimension $d$ and $A_d^\vee$ denotes its polar dual. For example, it is proved that $A_m^\vee \oplus A_n^\vee$ with $\min\{m,n\} \leq 1$ or $m+n \leq 7$, $A_2^\vee \oplus (A_1^\vee)^{\oplus n}$ and $A_3^\vee \oplus (A_1^\vee)^{\oplus n…
We prove that the Ehrhart polynomial of a zonotope is a specialization of the multiplicity Tutte polynomial. We derive some formulae for the volume and the number of integer points of the zonotope.
The Ehrhart polynomial of an integral convex polytope counts the number of lattice points in dilates of the polytope. In math.CO/0402148, the authors conjectured that for any cyclic polytope with integral parameters, the Ehrhart polynomial of it is equal to its volume plus the Ehrhart polynomial of its lower envelope and proved the case when the dimension d = 2. In our article, we prove the conjecture for any dimension.
In 1976, P. R. Scott characterized the Ehrhart polynomials of convex integral polygons. We study the same question for Ehrhart polynomials and quasi-polynomials of *non*-integral convex polygons. Turning to the case in which the Ehrhart quasi-polynomial has nontrivial quasi-period, we determine the possible minimal periods of the coefficient functions of the Ehrhart quasi-polynomial of a rational polygon.
Recently, Chapoton found a $q$-analog of Ehrhart polynomials, which are polynomials in $x$ whose coefficients are rational functions in $q$. Chapoton conjectured the shape of the Newton polygon of the numerator of the $q$-Ehrhart polynomial of an order polytope. In this paper, we prove Chapoton's conjecture.
Ehrhart discovered that the function that counts the number of lattice points in dilations of an integral polytope is a polynomial. We call the coefficients of this polynomial Ehrhart coefficients, and say a polytope is Ehrhart positive if all Ehrhart coefficients are positive (which is not true for all integral polytopes). The main purpose of this article is to survey interesting families of polytopes that are known to be Ehrhart positive and discuss the reasons from which their Ehrhart positivity follows. We also include examples of polytopes that have negative Ehrhart coefficients and polyt…
A rational polytope is the convex hull of a finite set of points in $\R^d$ with rational coordinates. Given a rational polytope $P \subseteq \R^d$, Ehrhart proved that, for $t\in\Z_{\ge 0}$, the function $#(tP \cap \Z^d)$ agrees with a quasi-polynomial $L_P(t)$, called the Ehrhart quasi-polynomial. The Ehrhart quasi-polynomial can be regarded as a discrete version of the volume of a polytope. We use that analogy to derive a new proof of Ehrhart's theorem. This proof also allows us to quickly prove two other facts about Ehrhart quasi-polynomials: McMullen's theorem about the periodicity of the …
In this paper, we give a formula for the number of lattice points in the dilations of Schubert matroid polytopes. As applications, we obtain the Ehrhart polynomials of uniform and minimal matroids as special cases, and give a recursive formula for the Ehrhart polynomials of $(a,b)$-Catalan matroids. Ferroni showed that uniform and minimal matroids are Ehrhart positive. We show that all sparse paving Schubert matroids are Ehrhart positive and their Ehrhart polynomials are coefficient-wisely bounded by those of minimal and uniform matroids. This confirms a conjecture of Ferroni for the case of s…
We study a class of polynomials that has all of its roots on the critical line and shares many properties with Ehrhart polynomials. Braun showed that the roots of Ehrhart polynomials are bounded quadratically and Higashitani provided examples for polytopes whose Ehrhart polynomial roots come close to this bound. In the case of polytopes which have their roots on the critical line, we present an improved bound. As a side effect this confirms a special case of a conjecture of Braun.
In the present paper, we introduce a multibasic extension of the Ehrhart theory. We give a multibasic extension of Ehrhart polynomials and Ehrhart series. We also show that an analogue of Ehrhart reciprocity holds for multibasic Ehrhart polynomials.
In 1976, P. R. Scott characterized the Ehrhart polynomials of convex integral polygons. We study the same question for Ehrhart polynomials and quasi-polynomials of \emph{non}-integral convex polygons. Define a \emph{pseudo-integral polygon}, or \emph{PIP}, to be a convex rational polygon whose Ehrhart quasi-polynomial is a polynomial. The numbers of lattice points on the interior and on the boundary of a PIP determine its Ehrhart polynomial. We show that, unlike the integral case, there exist PIPs with $b=1$ or $b=2$ boundary points and an arbitrary number $I \ge 1$ of interior points. However…
We use the ordinary Euler operator to compute the Ehrhart series for an arbitrary lattice polytope. The resulting formula involves the coefficients of the Ehrhart polynomial, combined via Eulerian numbers. We use this to compute $h^*_{d-1}$ in terms of the coefficients of the Ehrhart polynomial, resulting in a new linear inequality satisfied by the coefficents of the Ehrhart polynomial.
We investigate properties of Ehrhart polynomials for matroid polytopes, independence matroid polytopes, and polymatroids. In the first half of the paper we prove that for fixed rank their Ehrhart polynomials are computable in polynomial time. The proof relies on the geometry of these polytopes as well as a new refined analysis of the evaluation of Todd polynomials. In the second half we discuss two conjectures about the h^*-vector and the coefficients of Ehrhart polynomials of matroid polytopes; we provide theoretical and computational evidence for their validity.
It is shown that, for each $d \geq 4$, there exists an integral convex polytope $\mathcal{P}$ of dimension $d$ such that each of the coefficients of $n, n^{2}, \ldots, n^{d-2}$ of its Ehrhart polynomial $i(\mathcal{P},n)$ is negative.
Steingrimsson (2001) showed that the chromatic polynomial of a graph is the Hilbert function of a relative Stanley-Reisner ideal. We approach this result from the point of view of Ehrhart theory and give a sufficient criterion for when the Ehrhart polynomial of a given relative polytopal complex is a Hilbert function in Steingrimsson's sense. We use this result to establish that the modular and integral flow and tension polynomials of a graph are Hilbert functions.
We give a new definition of lattice-face polytopes by removing an unnecessary restriction in the paper "Ehrhart polynomials of lattice-face polytopes", and show that with the new definition, the Ehrhart polynomial of a lattice-face polytope still has the property that each coefficient is the normalized volume of a projection of the original polytope. Furthermore, we show that the new family of lattice-face polytopes contains all possible combinatorial types of rational polytopes.
We provide a formula for the Ehrhart polynomial of the connected matroid of size $n$ and rank $k$ with the least number of bases, also known as a minimal matroid. We prove that their polytopes are Ehrhart positive and $h^*$-real-rooted (and hence unimodal). We prove that the operation of circuit-hyperplane relaxation relates minimal matroids and matroid polytopes subdivisions, and also preserves Ehrhart positivity. We state two conjectures: that indeed all matroids are $h^*$-real-rooted, and that the coefficients of the Ehrhart polynomial of a connected matroid of fixed rank and cardinality ar…
A \emph{quasi-polynomial} is a function defined of the form $q(k) = c_d(k) k^d + c_{d-1}(k) k^{d-1} + ... + c_0(k)$, where $c_0, c_1, ..., c_d$ are periodic functions in $k \in \Z$. Prominent examples of quasi-polynomials appear in Ehrhart's theory as integer-point counting functions for rational polytopes, and McMullen gives upper bounds for the periods of the $c_j(k)$ for Ehrhart quasi-polynomials. For generic polytopes, McMullen's bounds seem to be sharp, but sometimes smaller periods exist. We prove that the second leading coefficient of an Ehrhart quasi-polynomial always has maximal expec…
It is shown that, for each $d \geq 4$, there exists an integral convex polytope $\mathcal{P}$ of dimension $d$ such that each of the coefficients of $n, n^{2}, \ldots, n^{d-2}$ of its Ehrhart polynomial $i(\mathcal{P},n)$ is negative. Moreover, it is also shown that for each $d \geq 3$ and $1 \leq k \leq d-2$, there exists an integral convex polytope $\mathcal{P}$ of dimension $d$ such that the coefficient of $n^k$ of the Ehrhart polynomial $i(\mathcal{P},n)$ of $\mathcal{P}$ is negative and all its remaining coefficients are positive. Finally, we consider all the possible sign patterns of the…
A seminal result of E. Ehrhart states that the number of integer lattice points in the dilation of a rational polytope by a positive integer $k$ is a quasi-polynomial function of $k$ --- that is, a "polynomial" in which the coefficients are themselves periodic functions of $k$. Using a result of F. Liu on the Ehrhart polynomials of cyclic polytopes, we construct not-necessarily-convex rational polytopes of arbitrary dimension in which the periods of the coefficient functions appearing in the Ehrhart quasi-polynomial take on arbitrary values.
Given an oriented graph G, the modular flow polynomial counts the number of nowhere-zero Z_k-flows of G. We give a description of the modular flow polynomial in terms of (open) Ehrhart polynomials of lattice polytopes. Using Ehrhart-Macdonald reciprocity we give a combinatorial interpretation for the values of the modular flow polynomial at negative arguments which answers a question of Beck and Zaslavsky (2006). Our construction extends to Z_l-tensions and we recover Stanley's reciprocity theorem for the chromatic polynomial. Combining the combinatorial reciprocity statements for flows and te…
The univariate Ehrhart and $h^*$-polynomials of lattice polytopes have been widely studied. We describe methods from toric geometry for computing multivariate versions of volume, Ehrhart and $h^*$-polynomials of lattice polytropes, which are both tropically and classically convex. These algorithms are applied to all polytropes of dimensions 2,3 and 4, yielding a large class of integer polynomials. We give a complete combinatorial description of the coefficients of volume polynomials of 3-dimensional polytropes in terms of regular central subdivisions of the fundamental polytope. Finally, we pr…
It was observed by Bump et al. that Ehrhart polynomials in a special family exhibit properties similar to the Riemann ζ function. The construction was generalized by Matsui et al. to a larger family of reflexive polytopes coming from graphs. We prove several conjectures confirming when such polynomials have zeros on a certain line in the complex plane. Our main new method is to prove a stronger property called interlacing.
We prove the unimodality of the Ehrhart $δ$-polynomial of the chain polytope of the zig-zag poset, which was conjectured by Kirillov. First, based on a result due to Stanley, we show that this polynomial coincides with the $W$-polynomial for the zig-zag poset with some natural labeling. Then, its unimodality immediately follows from a result of Gasharov, which states that the $W$-polynomials of naturally labeled graded posets of rank $1$ or $2$ are unimodal.
We say a polytope is Ehrhart positive if all the coefficients in its Ehrhart polynomial are positive. Answering an Ehrhart positivity question posed on Mathoverflow, Stanley provided an example of a non-Ehrhart-positive order polytope of dimension $21$. Stanley's example comes from a certain family of order polytopes. In this paper, we study the Ehrhart positivity question on this family of polytopes. By giving explicit formulas for the coefficients of the Ehrhart polynomials of these polytopes in terms of Bernolli numbers, we determine the sign of each Ehrhart coefficient of each polytope in …
We determine lattice polytopes of smallest volume with a given number of interior lattice points. We show that the Ehrhart polynomials of those with one interior lattice point have largest roots with norm of order n^2, where n is the dimension. This improves on the previously best known bound n and complements a recent result of Braun where it is shown that the norm of a root of an Ehrhart polynomial is at most of order n^2. For the class of 0-symmetric lattice polytopes we present a conjecture on the smallest volume for a given number of interior lattice points and prove the conjecture for cr…
The n'th Birkhoff polytope is the set of all doubly stochastic n-by-n matrices, that is, those matrices with nonnegative real coefficients in which every row and column sums to one. A wide open problem concerns the volumes of these polytopes, which have been known for n up to 8. We present a new, complex-analytic way to compute the Ehrhart polynomial of the Birkhoff polytope, that is, the function counting the integer points in the dilated polytope. One reason to be interested in this counting function is that the leading term of the Ehrhart polynomial is--up to a trivial factor--the volume of…
Over a decade ago De Loera, Haws and Köppe conjectured that Ehrhart polynomials of matroid polytopes have only positive coefficients and that the coefficients of the corresponding $h^*$-polynomials form a unimodal sequence. The first of these intensively studied conjectures has recently been disproved by the first author who gave counterexamples in all ranks greater or equal to three. In this article we complete the picture by showing that Ehrhart polynomials of matroids of lower rank have indeed only positive coefficients. Moreover, we show that they are coefficient-wise bounded by the Ehrhar…
A polytope is integral if all of its vertices are lattice points. The constant term of the Ehrhart polynomial of an integral polytope is known to be 1. In previous work, we showed that the coefficients of the Ehrhart polynomial of a lattice-face polytope are volumes of projections of the polytope. We generalize both results by introducing a notion of $k$-integral polytopes, where 0-integral is equivalent to integral. We show that the Ehrhart polynomial of a $k$-integral polytope $P$ has the properties that the coefficients in degrees less than or equal to $k$ are determined by a projection of …
A complete classification of the $δ$-vectors of lattice polytopes whose normalized volumes are at most $4$ is known. In the present paper, we will classify all the $δ$-vectors of lattice polytopes with normalized volumes $5$.
It is proved that a certain symmetric sequence of nonnegative integers arising in the enumeration of magic squares of given size n by row sums or, equivalently, in the generating function of the Ehrhart polynomial of the polytope of doubly stochastic n by n matrices, is equal to the h-vector of a simplicial polytope and hence that it satisfies the conditions of the g-theorem. The unimodality of this sequance, which follows, was conjectured by Stanley (1983). Several generalizations are given.
We extend to Barvinok's valuations the Euler-Maclaurin expansion formula which we obtained previously for the sum of values of a polynomial over the integral points of a rational polytope. This leads to an improvement of Barvinok's polynomial type algorithm for computing the highest coefficients of the corresponding Ehrhart quasi-polynomial.
In these notes, we explain residue formulae for volumes of convex polytopes, and for Ehrahrt polynomials based on the notion of total residue. We apply this method to the computation of the volume of the Chan-Robbins polytope. The final computation is based on a total residue formula for the system $A_n$, similar to Morris identity. For flow polytopes, a formula of change of variables in total residues leads to a "nice formula" for Ehrhart polynomials in function of mixed volumes. We apply it to Pitman-Stanley polytope.
We use the method of steepest descents to study the root distribution of the Ehrhart polynomial of the $d$-dimensional cross-polytope, namely $\mathcal{L}_{d}$, as $d\rightarrow \infty$. We prove that the distribution function of the roots, approximately, as $d$ grows, by variation of argument of the generating function $\sum_{m\geq 0}\mathcal{L}_{d}(m)t^{m+x-1}=(1+t)^{d}(1-t)^{-d-1}t^{x-1}$, as $t$ varies appropriately on the segment of the imaginary line contained inside the unit disk.
If $P\subset \R^d$ is a rational polytope, then $i_P(n):=#(nP\cap \Z^d)$ is a quasi-polynomial in $n$, called the Ehrhart quasi-polynomial of $P$. The period of $i_P(n)$ must divide $\LL(P)= \min \{n \in \Z_{> 0} \colon nP \text{is an integral polytope}\}$. Few examples are known where the period is not exactly $\LL(P)$. We show that for any $\LL$, there is a 2-dimensional triangle $P$ such that $\LL(P)=\LL$ but such that the period of $i_P(n)$ is 1, that is, $i_P(n)$ is a polynomial in $n$. We also characterize all polygons $P$ such that $i_P(n)$ is a polynomial. In addition, we provide a cou…
There is a simple formula for the Ehrhart polynomial of a cyclic polytope. The purpose of this paper is to show that the same formula holds for a more general class of polytopes, lattice-face polytopes. We develop a way of decomposing any d-dimensional simplex in general position into d! signed sets, each of which corresponds to a permutation in the symmetric group, and reduce the problem of counting lattice points in a polytope in general position to that of counting lattice points in these special signed sets. Applying this decomposition to a lattice-face simplex, we obtain signed sets with …
