Motivated by a formula of A. Postnikov relating binary trees, we define the hook length polynomials for m-ary trees and plane forests, and show that these polynomials have a simple binomial expression. An integer value of this expression is C_{k,m}(n)=\frac{1}{mn+1}{(mn+1)k \choose n}, which we call the (k,m)-Catalan number. For proving the hook length formulas, we also introduce a combinatorial family, (k,m)-ary trees, which are counted by the (k,m)-Catalan numbers.
Let $λ$ be a partition, viewed as a Young diagram. We define the hook difference of a cell of $λ$ to be the difference of its leg and arm lengths. Define $h_{1,1}(λ)$ to be the number of cells of $λ$ with hook difference one. In the paper of Buryak and Feigin (arXiv:1206.5640), algebraic geometry is used to prove a generating function identity which implies that $h_{1,1}$ is equidistributed with $a_2$, the largest part of a partition that appears at least twice, over the partitions of a given size. In this paper, we propose a refinement of the theorem of Buryak and Feigin and prove some partia…
We count the number of closed walks on a vertex in a regular tree using the Catalan's triangle and also the Borel's triangle, showing another combinatorial structure counted by these two array of numbers.
We present an algorithmic mapping from permutations of length dn to labeled n-node d-ary trees and back again. Given such a bijection, one can interpret each of the factorials in the formula for the Catalan numbers as a count of permutations.
The aim of this note is to show how the introduction of certain tableaux, called Catalan alternative tableaux, provides a very simple and elegant description of the product in the Hopf algebra of binary trees defined by Loday and Ronco. Moreover, we use this description to introduce a new associative product on the space of binary trees.
In "Square partitions and Catalan numbers" (arXiv0912.4983), Bennett et al. presented a recursive algorithm to create a family of partitions from one or several partitions. They were mainly interested in the cases when we begin with a single square partition or with several partitions with only one part. The cardinalities of those families of partitions are the Catalan and ballot numbers, respectively. In this paper we present a closed description for those families. We also present bijections between those sets of partitions and sets of trees and forests enumerated by the Catalan an ballot nu…
In this short note we discuss recent results on hook length formulas of trees unifying some earlier results, and explain hook length formulas naturally associated to families of increasingly labelled trees.
We demonstrate that a natural construction based on the two notions of insertion of a strand and finding the preimages of Temperley-Lieb algebra generators give an inductive means to generate all link patterns of a given number of strands. It is shown that the structure of the Catalan tree (as defined by Julian West) arises in the process of this induction, and that it can be exploited to give some refined enumerations of link patterns.
We introduce a transformation of finite integer sequences, show that every sequence eventually stabilizes under this transformation and that the number of fixed points is counted by the Catalan numbers. The sequences that are fixed are precisely those that describe themselves -- every term $t$ is equal to the number of previous terms that are smaller than $t$. In addition, we provide an easy way to enumerate all these self-describing sequences by organizing them in a Catalan tree with a specific labelling system.
We discover another one-parameter generalization of Postnikov's hook length formula for binary trees. The particularity of our formula is that the hook length $h_v$ appears as an exponent. As an application, we derive another simple hook length formula for binary trees when the underlying parameter takes the value 1/2.
In this paper we determine the parity of some sequences which are related to Catalan numbers. Also we introduce a combinatorical object called, \Catalan tree", and discuss its properties.
In this paper, we define two kinds of hook length for internal vertices of complete $m$-ary trees, and deduce their corresponding hook length formulas, which generalize the main results obtained by Du and Liu.
Recently Féray, Goulden and Lascoux gave a proof of a new hook summation formula for unordered increasing trees by means of a generalization of the Prüfer code for labelled trees and posed the problem of finding a bijection between weighted increasing trees and Cayley trees. We give such a bijection, providing an answer to the problem posed by Féray, Goulden and Lascoux as well as showing a combinatorial connection to the theory of tree volumes defined by Kelmans. In addition we give two simple proofs of the hook summation formula. As an application we describe how the hook summation formula g…
Recently Han obtained a general formula for the weight function corresponding to the expansion of a generating function in terms of hook lengths of binary trees. In this paper, we present formulas for k-ary trees, plane trees, plane forests, labeled trees and forests. We also find appropriate generating functions which lead to unifications of the hook length formulas due to Du and Liu, Han, Gessel and Seo, and Postnikov.
We investigate certain nonassociative binary operations that satisfy a four-parameter generalization of the associative law. From this we obtain variations of the ubiquitous Catalan numbers and connections to many interesting combinatorial objects such as binary trees, plane trees, lattice paths, and permutations.
The purpose of this paper is twofold. First we answer to a question asked by Steingrimsson and Williams about certain permutation tableaux: we construct a bijection between binary trees and the so-called Catalan tableaux. These tableaux are certain Ferrers (or Young) diagrams filled with some 0's and 1's, satisfying a certain hook condition, and are enumerated by the Catalan numbers. They form a subclass of the permutation tableaux, enumerated by n!, introduced by Postnikov in his study of totally non negative Grassmannians and networks. Secondly we relate this new Catalan bijection with the t…
Recently, Han obtained two hook length formulas for binary trees and asked for combinatorial proofs. One of Han's formulas has been generalized to k-ary trees by Yang. Sagan has found a probabilistic proof of Yang's extension. We give combinatorial proofs of Yang's formula for k-ary trees and the other formula of Han for binary trees. Our bijections are based on the structure of k-ary trees with staircase labelings.
Recently, Han discovered two formulas involving binary trees which have the interestig property that hooklengths appear as exponents. The purpose of this note is to give a probabilistic proof of one of Han's formulas. Yang has generalized Han's results to ordered trees. We show how the probabilistic approach can also be used in Yang's setting, as well as for a generalization of Han's formula in terms of certain infinite trees.
Han recently discovered new hook length identities for binary trees. In this paper, we extend Han's identities to binomial families of trees. Moreover, we present a bijective proof of one of the identities for the family of ordered trees.
In this work we introduce and study various generalizations of the notion of increasingly labelled trees, where the label of a child node is always larger than the label of its parent node, to multilabelled tree families, where the nodes in the tree can get multiple labels. For all tree classes we show characterizations of suitable generating functions for the tree enumeration sequence via differential equations. Furthermore, for several combinatorial classes of multilabelled increasing tree families we present explicit enumeration results. We also present multilabelled increasing tree familie…
We introduce the hook length expansion technique and explain how to discover old and new hook length formulas for partitions and plane trees. The new hook length formulas for trees obtained by our method can be proved rather easily, whereas those for partitions are much more difficult and some of them still remain open conjectures. We also develop a Maple package HookExp for computing the hook length expansion. The paper can be seen as a collection of hook length formulas for partitons and plane trees. All examples are illustrated by HookExp and, for many easy cases, expained by well-known com…
A number of hook formulas and hook summation formulas have previously appeared, involving various classes of trees. One of these classes of trees is rooted trees with labelled vertices, in which the labels increase along every chain from the root vertex to a leaf. In this paper we give a new hook summation formula for these (unordered increasing) trees, by introducing a new set of indeterminates indexed by pairs of vertices, that we call edge weights. This new result generalizes a previous result by Féray and Goulden, that arose in the context of representations of the symmetric group via the …
We compute the expansion of the Catalan family of Lie idempotents introduced in [Menous et al., Adv. Applied Math. 51 (2013), 177-22] on the PBW basis of the Lie module. It is found that the coefficient of a tree depends only on its number of left and right internal edges. In particular, the Catalan idempotents belong to a preLie algebra based on naked binary trees, of which we identify several Lie and preLie subalgebras.
The Catalan number $C_n$ enumerates parenthesizations of $x_0*\dotsb*x_n$ where $*$ is a binary operation. We introduce the modular Catalan number $C_{k,n}$ to count equivalence classes of parenthesizations of $x_0*\dotsb*x_n$ when $*$ satisfies a $k$-associative law generalizing the usual associativity. This leads to a study of restricted families of Catalan objects enumerated by $C_{k,n}$ with emphasis on binary trees, plane trees, and Dyck paths, each avoiding certain patterns. We give closed formulas for $C_{k,n}$ with two different proofs. For each $n\ge0$ we compute the largest size of $…
We find a generating function expressed as a continued fraction that enumerates ordered trees by the number of vertices at different levels. Several Catalan problems are mapped to an ordered-tree problem and their generating functions also expressed as a continued fraction. Among these problems is the enumeration of (132)-pattern avoiding permutations that have a given number of increasing patterns of length k. This extends and illuminates a result of Robertson, Wilf and Zeilberger for the case k=3.
Catalan numbers $C(n)=\frac{1}{n+1}{2n\choose n}$ enumerate binary trees and Dyck paths. The distribution of paths with respect to their number $k$ of factors is given by ballot numbers $B(n,k)=\frac{n-k}{n+k}{n+k\choose n}$. These integers are known to satisfy simple recurrence, which may be visualised in a ``Catalan triangle'', a lower-triangular two-dimensional array. It is surprising that the extension of this construction to 3 dimensions generates integers $B_3(n,k,l)$ that give a 2-parameter distribution of $C_3(n)=\frac 1 {2n+1} {3n\choose n}$, which may be called order-3 Fuss-Catalan n…
Descending plane partitions, alternating sign matrices, and totally symmetric self-complementary plane partitions are equinumerous combinatorial sets for which no explicit bijection is known. In this paper, we isolate a subset of descending plane partitions counted by the Catalan numbers. The proof follows by constructing a generating tree on these descending plane partitions that has the same structure as the generating tree for 231-avoiding permutations. We hope this result will provide insight on the search for a bijection with alternating sign matrices and/or totally symmetric self-complem…
Nicholas Pippenger and Kristin Schleich have recently given a combinatorial interpretation for the second-order super-Catalan numbers (u_{n})_{n>=0}=(3,2,3,6,14,36,...): they count "aligned cubic trees" on n internal vertices. Here we give a combinatorial interpretation of the recurrence u_{n} = Sum_{k=0}^{n/2-1} ({n-2}choose{2k} 2^{n-2-2k} u_{k}): it counts these trees by number of deep interior vertices where deep interior means "neither a leaf nor adjacent to a leaf".
The Raney numbers $R_{p,r}(n)$ are a two-parameter generalization of the Catalan numbers that were introduced by Raney in his investigation of functional composition patterns \cite{Raney}. We give a new combinatorial interpretation for all Raney numbers in terms of planar embeddings of certain collections of trees, a construction that recovers the usual interpretation of the $p$-Catalan numbers in terms of $p$-ary trees via the specialization $R_{p,1}(n) =_{p} c_n$. Our technique leads to several combinatorial identities involving the Raney numbers and ordered partitions. We then give addition…
The Catalan numbers (C_n)_{n >= 0} = 1,1,2,5,14,42,... form one of the most venerable sequences in combinatorics. They have many combinatorial interpretations, from counting bracketings of products in non-associative algebra to counting plane trees and noncrossing set partitions. They also arise in the GUE matrix model as the leading coefficient of certain polynomials, a connection closely related to the plane trees and noncrossing set partitions interpretations. In this paper we define a generalization of the Catalan numbers. In fact we define an infinite collection of generalizations C_n^(m)…
The Catalan numbers constitute one of the most important sequences in combinatorics. Catalan objects have been generalized in various directions, including the classical Fuss-Catalan objects and the rational Catalan generalization of Armstrong-Rhoades-Williams. We propose a wider generalization of these families indexed by a composition $s$ which is motivated by the combinatorics of planar rooted trees; when $s=(2,...,2)$ and $s=(k+1,...,k+1)$ we recover the classical Catalan and Fuss-Catalan combinatorics, respectively. Furthermore, to each pair $(a,b)$ of relatively prime numbers we can asso…
In this paper, we present an involution on some kind of colored $k$-ary trees which provides a combinatorial proof of a combinatorial sum involving the generalized Catalan numbers $C_{k,γ}(n)=\fracγ{k n+γ}{k n+γ\choose n}$. From the combinatorial sum, we refine the formula for $k$-ary trees and obtain an implicit formula for the generating function of the generalized Catalan numbers which obviously implies a Vandermonde type convolution generalized by Gould. Furthermore, we also obtain a combinatorial sum involving a vector generalization of the Catalan numbers by an extension of our involutio…
We show that families of action graphs, with initial graphs which are linear of varying length, give rise to self-convolutions of the Catalan sequence. We prove this result via a comparison with planar rooted forests with a fixed number of trees.
An and/or tree is usually a binary plane tree, with internal nodes labelled by logical connectives, and with leaves labelled by literals chosen in a fixed set of k variables and their negations. In the present paper, we introduce the first model of such Catalan trees, whose number of variables k_n is a function of n, the size of the expressions. We describe the whole range of the probability distributions depending on the function k_n, as soon as it tends jointly with n to infinity. As a by-product we obtain a study of the satisfiability problem in the context of Catalan trees. Our study is ma…
We introduce an inductively defined sequence of directed graphs and prove that the number of edges added at step $k$ is equal to the $k$th Catalan number. Furthermore, we establish an isomorphism between the set of edges adjoined at step $k$ and the set of planar rooted trees with $k$ edges.
Motivated by the question of finding a type B analogue of the bijection between oscillating tableaux and matchings, we find a correspondence between oscillating m-rim hook tableaux and m-colored matchings, where m is a positive integer. An oscillating m-rim hook tableau is defined as a sequence $(λ^0,λ^1,...,λ^{2n})$ of Young diagrams starting with the empty shape and ending with the empty shape such that $λ^{i}$ is obtained from $λ^{i-1}$ by adding an m-rim hook or by deleting an m-rim hook. Our bijection relies on the generalized Schensted algorithm due to White. An oscillating 2-rim hook ta…
Additive tree functionals represent the cost of many divide-and-conquer algorithms. We derive the limiting distribution of the additive functionals induced by toll functions of the form (a) n^αwhen α> 0 and (b) log n (the so-called shape functional) on uniformly distributed binary search trees, sometimes called Catalan trees. The Gaussian law obtained in the latter case complements the central limit theorem for the shape functional under the random permutation model. Our results give rise to an apparently new family of distributions containing the Airy distribution (α= 1) and the normal distri…
In 1995, the first author introduced a multivariate generating function {$G$} that tracks the distribution of ascents and descents in labeled binary trees. In addition to proving that $G$ is symmetric, he conjectured that $G$ is Schur positive. We prove this conjecture by expanding $G$ positively in terms of ribbon Schur functions. We obtain this expansion using a weight-preserving bijection whose inverse is inspired by the Push-Glide algorithm of Préville-Ratelle and Viennot. In fact, this weight-preserving bijection allows us to establish a stronger version of the first author's conjecture s…
In this note, we provide a bijection between a new collection of words on nonnegative integers of length n and Dyck paths of length 2n-2, thus proving that this collection belongs to the Catalan family. The surprising key step in this bijection is the zeta map which is an important map in the study of q,t-Catalan numbers. Finally we discuss an alternative approach to this new collection of words using two statistics on planted trees that turn out to be closely related to the Tutte polynomial on the Catalan matroid.
We establish combinatorial interpretations of several identities for the Catalan and Fine numbers and, along the way, we present some new bijections of independent interest. Briefly, we show that C_{n} = 1/(n+1) Sum_{k} (n+1)choose(2k+1) (n+k)choose(k) counts ordered trees on n edges by number of interior vertices adjacent to a leaf, and C_{n} = 2/(n+1) Sum_{k} (n+1)choose(k+2) (n-2)choose(k) counts Dyck n-paths by number of long interior inclines. We also give an analogue for the Fine numbers of Touchard's Catalan number identity.
Several hook summation formulae for binary trees have appeared recently in the literature. In this paper we present an analogous formula for unordered increasing trees of size r, which involves r parameters. The right-hand side can be written nicely as a product of linear factors. We study two specializations of this new formula, including Cayley's enumeration of trees with respect to vertex degree. We give three proofs of the hook formula. One of these proofs arises somewhat indirectly, from representation theory of the symmetric groups, and in particular uses Kerov's character polynomials. T…
We study the average leaf-to-leaf path lengths on ordered Catalan tree graphs with $n$ nodes and show that these are equivalent to the average length of paths starting from the root node. We give an explicit analytic formula for the average leaf-to-leaf path length as a function of separation of the leaves and study its asymptotic properties. At the heart of our method is a strategy based on an abstract graph representation of generating functions.
In this paper we present a CAT generation algorithm for Dyck paths with a fixed length n. It is the formalization of a method for the exhaustive generation of this kind of paths which can be described by means of two equivalent strategies. The former is described by a rooted tree, the latter lists the paths by means of three operations which, as we are going to see, are equivalent to visit the tree. These constructions are strictly connected with ECO method and can be encoded by a rule, very similar to the succession rule in ECO, with a finite number of labels for each n. Moreover with a sligh…
The original motivation for study for hook length polynomials was to find a combinatorial proof for a hook length formula for binary trees given by Postnikov, as well as a proof for a hook length polynomial formula conjectured by Lascoux. In this paper, we define the hook length polynomial for plane forests of a given degree sequence type and show it can be factored into a product of linear forms. Some other enumerative results on forests are also given.
We define two symmetric $q,t$-Catalan polynomials in terms of the area and depth statistic and in terms of the dinv and dinv of depth statistics. We prove symmetry using an involution on plane trees. The same involution proves symmetry of the Tutte polynomials. We also provide a combinatorial proof of a remark by Garsia et al. regarding parking functions and the number of connected graphs on a fixed number of vertices.
Additive tree functionals allow to represent the cost of many divide-and-conquer algorithms. We give an invariance principle for such tree functionals for the Catalan model (random tree uniformly distributed among the full binary ordered trees with given number of internal nodes) and for simply generated trees (including random tree uniformly distributed among the ordered trees with given number of nodes). In the Catalan model, this relies on the natural embedding of binary trees into the Brownian excursion and then on elementary second moment computations. We recover results first given by Fi…
We investigate the tree gonality of a genus-$g$ metric graph, defined as the minimum degree of a tropical morphism from any tropical modification of the metric graph to a metric tree. We give a combinatorial constructive proof that this number is at most $\lceil g/2 \rceil + 1$, a fact whose proofs so far required an algebro-geometric detour via special divisors on curves. For even genus, the tropical morphism which realizes the bound belongs to a family of tropical morphisms that is pure of dimension $3g-3$ and that has a generically finite-to-one map onto the moduli space of genus-$g$ metric…
For each integer $k\ge 1$, we define an algorithm which associates to a partition whose maximal value is at most $k$ a certain subset of all partitions. In the case when we begin with a partition $λ$ which is square, i.e $λ=λ_1\ge...\geλ_k>0$, and $λ_1=k,λ_k=1$, then applying the algorithm $\ell$ times gives rise to a set whose cardinality is either the Catalan number $c_{\ell-k+1}$ (the self dual case) or twice the Catalan number. The algorithm defines a tree and we study the propagation of the tree, which is not in the isomorphism class of the usual Catalan tree. The algorithm can also be mo…
We give a simple explanation why the stationary state of the 1D TASEP model with open boundaries is related to the Catalan numbers. Our construction is based on planar binary trees and provides a combinatorial solution of the stationary state. We discuss the relation to Catalan tableaux approaches in an appendix.
This paper studies a generalization of parking functions named $k$-Naples parking functions, where backward movement is allowed. One consequence of backward movement is that the number of ascending $k$-Naples is not the same as the number of descending $k$-Naples. This paper focuses on generalizing the bijections of ascending parking functions with combinatorial objects enumerated by the Catalan numbers in the setting of both ascending and descending $k$-Naples parking functions. These combinatorial objects include Dyck paths, binary trees, triangulations of polygons, and non-crossing partitio…
Noncrossing set partitions, nonnesting set partitions, Dyck paths, and rooted plane trees are four classes of Catalan objects which carry a notion of type. There exists a product formula which enumerates these objects according to type. We define a notion of `connectivity' for these objects and prove an analogous product formula which counts connected objects by type. Our proof of this product formula is combinatorial and bijective. We extend this to a product formula which counts objects with a fixed type and number of connected components. We relate our product formulas to symmetric function…
In 1986, Shi derived the famous formula $(n+1)^{n-1}$ for the number of regions of the Shi arrangement, a hyperplane arrangement in $\mathbb{R}^n$. There are at least two different bijective explanations of this formula, one by Pak and Stanley, another by Athanasiadis and Linusson. In 1996, Athanasiadis used the finite field method to derive a formula for the number of $k$-dimensional faces of the Shi arrangement for any $k$. Until now, the formula of Athanasiadis did not have a bijective explanation. In this paper, we extend a bijection for regions defined by Bernardi to obtain a bijection be…
We consider weighted generating functions of trees where the weights are products of functions of the sizes of the subtrees. This work begins with the observation that three different communities, largely independently, found substantially the same result concerning these series. We unify these results with a common generalization. Next we use the insights of one community on the problems of another in two different ways. Namely, we use the differential equation perspective to find a number of new interesting hook length formulae for trees, and we use the body of examples developed by the comb…
We consider planar cubic maps, i.e. connected cubic graphs imbedded into plane, with marked spanning tree and marked directed edge (not in this tree). The number of such objects with $2n$ vertices is $C_{2n}\cdot C_{n+1}$, where $C_k$ is $k$-th Catalan number.
We associate a complete non-singular fan with a polygon triangulation. Such a fan appears from a certain toric Richardson variety, called of Catalan type introduced in this paper. A toric Richardson variety of Catalan type is a Fano Bott manifold. We show that toric Richardson varieties of Catalan type are classified up to isomorphism in terms of unordered binary trees. In particular, the number of isomorphism classes of $n$-dimensional toric Richardson varieties of Catalan type is the $(n+1)$th Wedderburn--Etherington number.
