We study a family of polynomials whose values express degrees of Schubert varieties in the generalized complex flag manifold G/B. The polynomials are given by weighted sums over saturated chains in the Bruhat order. We derive several explicit formulas for these polynomials, and investigate their relations with Schubert polynomials, harmonic polynomials, Demazure characters, and generalized Littlewood-Richardson coefficients. In the second half of the paper, we concern with the case of to the classical flag manifold of Lie type A and discuss related combinatorial objects: flagged Schur polynomials, 312-avoiding permutations, generalized Gelfand-Tsetlin polytopes, the inverse Schubert-Kostka matrix, parking functions, and binary trees.
We give new formulas for Grothendieck polynomials of two types. One type expresses any specialization of a Grothendieck polynomial in at least two sets of variables as a linear combination of products Grothendieck polynomials in each set of variables, with coefficients Schubert structure constants for Grothendieck polynomials. The other type is in terms of chains in the Bruhat order. We compare this second type to other constructions of Grothendieck polynomials within the more general context of double Grothendieck polynomials and the closely related H-polynomials. Our methods are based upon t…
The totally nonnegative Grassmannian $\mathrm{Gr}(k,n)_{\geq0}$ is the subset of the real Grassmannian $\mathrm{Gr}(k,n)$ consisting of points with all nonnegative Plücker coordinates. The circular Bruhat order is a poset isomorphic to the face poset of A. Postnikov's (2005) positroid cell decomposition of $\mathrm{Gr}(k,n)_{\geq0}$. We provide a closed formula for the sum of its weighted chains in the spirit of J. Stembridge (2002).
Let (W, S) be a Coxeter system. We investigate combinatorially certain partial orders, called extended Bruhat orders, on a (W x W)-set W(N,C), which depends on W, a subset N of S, and a component C of N. We determine the length of the maximal chains between two elements. These posets generalize W equipped with its Bruhat order. They include the (W x W)-orbits of the Renner monoids of reductive algebraic monoids and of some infinite dimensional generalizations which are equipped with the partial orders obtained by the closure relations of the Bruhat and Birkhoff cells. They also include the (W …
We prove a common generalization of the fact that the weighted number of maximal chains in the strong Bruhat order on the symmetric group is ${n \choose 2}!$ for both the code weights and the Chevalley weights. We also define weights which give a one-parameter family of strong order analogues of Macdonald's reduced word identity for Schubert polynomials.
In this note we construct a poset map from a Boolean algebra to the Bruhat order which unveils an interesting connection between subword complexes, sorting orders, and certain totally nonnegative spaces. This relationship gives a new proof of Björner and Wachs' result \cite{BW} that the proper part of Bruhat order is homotopy equivalent to the proper part of a Boolean algebra --- that is, to a sphere. We also obtain a geometric interpretation for sorting orders. We conclude with two new results: that the intersection of all sorting orders is the weak order, and the union of sorting orders is t…
We discuss a surprising relationship between the partially ordered set of Newton points associated to an affine Schubert cell and the quantum cohomology of the complex flag variety. The main theorem provides a combinatorial formula for the unique maximum element in this poset in terms of paths in the quantum Bruhat graph, whose vertices are indexed by elements in the finite Weyl group. Key to establishing this connection is the fact that paths in the quantum Bruhat graph encode saturated chains in the strong Bruhat order on the affine Weyl group. This correspondence is also fundamental in the …
The rook monoid $R_n$ is the finite monoid whose elements are the 0-1 matrices with at most one nonzero entry in each row and column. The group of invertible elements of $R_n$ is isomorphic to the symmetric group $S_n$. The natural extension to $R_n$ of the Bruhat-Chevalley ordering on the symmetric group is defined in \cite{Renner86}. In this paper, we find an efficient, combinatorial description of the Bruhat-Chevalley ordering on $R_n$. We also give a useful, combinatorial formula for the length function on $R_n$.
A permutation is called smooth if the corresponding Schubert variety is smooth. Gilboa and Lapid prove that in the symmetric group, multiplying the reflections below a smooth element $w$ in Bruhat order in a compatible order yields back the element $w$. We strengthen this result by showing that such a product in fact determines a saturated chain $e \to w$ in Bruhat order, and that this property characterizes smooth elements.
In this paper, we extend Manin and Schechtman's higher Bruhat orders for the symmetric group to higher Bruhat orders for non-longest words $w$ in $S_n$. We prove that the higher Bruhat orders of non-longest words are ranked posets with unique minimal and maximal elements. As in Manin and Schechtman's original paper, the $k$-th Bruhat order for $w$ is created out of equivalence classes of maximal chains in its $(k-1)$-st Bruhat order. We also define the second and third Bruhat orders for arbitrary realizable k-sets, and prove that the second Bruhat order has a unique minimal and maximal element…
In a tropical approximation, any tree-shaped line soliton solution, a member of the simplest class of soliton solutions of the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili (KP-II) equation, determines a chain of planar rooted binary trees, connected by right rotation. More precisely, it determines a maximal chain of a Tamari lattice. We show that an analysis of these solutions naturally involves higher Bruhat and higher Tamari orders.
We give an explicit description of the closure containment order (or "Bruhat order") on the set of orbits of GL_p \times GL_q on the flag variety GL_{p+q}/B, relative to the parametrization of the orbits by combinatorial objects called "clans". This leads to a corresponding description of the closures of such orbits as sets of flags satisfying certain incidence conditions encoded by the parametrizing clans.
Given a positive integer $n$ and a nonnegative integer $k$ with $k\leq n$, we denote by $\mathcal{A}(n,k)$ the class of all $n$-by-$n$ $(0,1)$-matrices with constant row and column sums $k$. In this paper, we show that the Bruhat order and the secondary Bruhat order coincide on $\mathcal{A}(n,k)$ if and only if either $0\leq n\leq 5$ or $k\in\{0,1,2,n-2,n-1,n\}$ with $n\geq 6$.
The main purpose of this paper is to prove that the Bruhat-Chevalley ordering of the symmetric group when restricted to the fixed-point-free involutions forms an $EL$-shellable poset whose order complex triangulates a ball. Another purpose of this article is to prove that the Deodhar-Srinivasan poset is a proper, graded subposet of the Bruhat-Chevalley poset on fixed-point-free involutions.
We study the partial orders induced on Wachs and signed Wachs permutations by the Bruhat and weak orders of the symmetric and hyperoctahedral groups. We show that these orders are graded, determine their rank function, characterize their ordering and covering relations, and compute their characteristic polynomials, when partially ordered by Bruhat order, and determine their structure explicitly when partially ordered by right weak order.
We show that any lower Bruhat interval in a Coxeter group is a disjoint union of certain two-sided cosets as a consequence of Lifting Property and Subword Property. Furthermore, we describe these details in terms of Bruhat graphs, graded posets, and two-sided quotients altogether. For this purpose, we introduce some new ideas, quotient lower intervals and quotient Bruhat graphs.
We give an explicit nonrecursive complete matching for the Hasse diagram of the strong Bruhat order of any interval in any Coxeter group. This yields a new derivation of the Mobius function, recovering a classical result due to Verma.
We propose versions of higher Bruhat orders for types $B$ and $C$. This is based on a theory of higher Bruhat orders of type~A and their geometric interpretations (due to Manin--Shekhtman, Voevodskii--Kapranov, and Ziegler), and on our study of the so-called symmetric cubillages of cyclic zonotopes.
We study the Ricci curvature of the Hasse diagrams of the Bruhat order of finite irreducible Coxeter groups. For this purpose we compute the maximum degree of these graphs for types $B_n$ and $D_n$. The proof uses a new graph $Γ(π)$ defined for any element $π$ in the corresponding group.
Structure constants for the multiplication of Schubert polynomials by Schur symmetric polynomials are known to be related to the enumeration of chains in a new partial order on S_\infty, which we call the universal k-Bruhat order. Here we present a monoid M for this order and show that $M$ is analogous to the nil-Coxeter monoid for the weak order on S_\infty. For this, we develop a theory of reduced sequences for M. We use these sequences to give a combinatorial description of the structure constants above. We also give combinatorial proofs of some of the symmetry relations satisfied by these …
Applying a classical theorem of Smith, we show that the poset property of being Gorenstein$^*$ over $\mathbb{Z}_2$ is inherited by the subposet of fixed points under an involutive poset automorphism. As an application, we prove that every interval in the Bruhat order on (twisted) involutions in an arbitrary Coxeter group has this property, and we find the rank function. This implies results conjectured by F. Incitti. We also show that the Bruhat order on the fixed points of an involutive automorphism induced by a Coxeter graph automorphism is isomorphic to the Bruhat order on the fixed subgrou…
We classify cocovers and covers of a given element of the double affine Weyl semigroup W with respect to the Bruhat order, specifically when W is associated to a finite root system that is irreducible and simply laced. We show two approaches: one extending the work of Lam and Shimozono, and its strengthening by Milicevic, where cocovers are characterized in the affine case using the quantum Bruhat graph of the finite Weyl group, and another, which takes a more geometrical approach by using the length difference set defined by Muthiah and Orr.
The higher Bruhat order is a poset of cubical tilings of a cyclic zonotope whose covering relations are cubical flips. For a 2-dimensional zonotope, the higher Bruhat order is isomorphic to a poset on commutation classes of reduced words for the longest element of a type A Coxeter system. For this case, we prove that the noncontractible intervals are in natural correspondence with the zonogonal tilings of a zonogon. Our proof uses some tools developed by Felsner and Weil to show that the two standard orderings on the rhombic tilings of a zonogon are identical.
For a permutation $π$ in the symmetric group $S_n$ let the {\it total degree} be its valency in the Hasse diagram of the strong Bruhat order on $S_n$, and let the {\it down degree} be the number of permutations which are covered by $π$ in the strong Bruhat order. The maxima of the total degree and the down degree and their values at a random permutation are computed. Proofs involve variants of a classical theorem of Turán from extremal graph theory.
We illuminate the relation between the Bruhat order on the symmetric group and structure constants (Littlewood-Richardson coefficients) for the cohomology of the flag manifold in terms of its basis of Schubert classes. Equivalently, the structure constants for the ring of polynomials in variables $x_1,x_2,...$ in terms of its basis of Schubert polynomials. We use combinatorial, algebraic, and geometric methods, notably a study of intersections of Schubert varieties and maps between flag manifolds. We establish a number of new identities among these structure constants. This leads to formulas f…
The quantum Bruhat graph, which is an extension of the graph formed by covering relations in the Bruhat order, is naturally related to the quantum cohomology ring of G/B. We enhance a result of Fulton and Woodward by showing that the minimal monomial in the quantum parameters that occurs in the quantum product of two Schubert classes has a simple interpretation in terms of directed paths in this graph. We define path Schubert polynomials, which are quantum cohomology analogues of skew Schubert polynomials recently introduced by Lenart and Sottile. They are given by sums over paths in the quant…
In this paper we study those generic intervals in the Bruhat order of the symmetric group that are isomorphic to the principal order ideal of a permutation w, and consider when the minimum and maximum elements of those intervals are related by a certain property of their reduced words. We show that the property does not hold when w is a decomposable permutation, and that the property always holds when w is the longest permutation.
The odd diagram of a permutation is a subset of the classical diagram with additional parity conditions. In this paper, we study classes of permutations with the same odd diagram, which we call odd diagram classes. First, we prove a conjecture relating odd diagram classes and 213- and 312-avoiding permutations. Secondly, we show that each odd diagram class is a Bruhat interval. Instrumental to our proofs is an explicit description of the Bruhat edges that link permutations in a class.
We show that the principal order ideal below an element w in the Bruhat order on involutions in a symmetric group is a Boolean lattice if and only if w avoids the patterns 4321, 45312 and 456123. Similar criteria for signed permutations are also stated. Involutions with this property are enumerated with respect to natural statistics. In this context, a bijective correspondence with certain Motzkin paths is demonstrated.
Let $G$ be a reductive algebraic group and let $Z$ be the stabilizer of a nilpotent element $e$ of the Lie algebra of $G$. We consider the action of $Z$ on the flag variety of $G$, and we focus on the case where this action has a finite number of orbits (i.e., $Z$ is a spherical subgroup). This holds for instance if $e$ has height $2$. In this case we give a parametrization of the $Z$-orbits and we show that each $Z$-orbit has a structure of algebraic affine bundle. In particular, in type $A$, we deduce that each orbit has a natural cell decomposition. In the aim to study the (strong) Bruhat o…
We introduce and study a family of operators which act in the span of a Weyl group $W$ and provide a multi-parameter solution to the quantum Yang-Baxter equations of the corresponding type. Our operators generalize the "quantum Bruhat operators" that appear in the explicit description of the multiplicative structure of the (small) quantum cohomology ring of $G/B$. The main combinatorial applications concern the "tilted Bruhat order," a graded poset whose unique minimal element is an arbitrarily chosen element $w\in W$. (The ordinary Bruhat order corresponds to the case $w=1$.) Using the mixed …
This paper provides a unifying and simplifying approach to Bruhat order in which the usual Bruhat order, parabolic Bruhat order, and Bruhat order for symmetric pairs are shown to have combinatorially analogous and relatively simple descriptions. Such analogies are valuable as they permit the study of PGB and KGB by reducing to BGB rather than by introducing additional machinery. A concise definition for reduced expressions and a simple proof of the exchange condition for PGB are provided as applications of this philosophy. A geometric argument for spherical subgroups, which includes all of the…
The structure of order ideals in the Bruhat order for the symmetric group is elucidated via permutation patterns. A method for determining non-isomorphic principal order ideals is described and applied for small lengths. The permutations with boolean principal order ideals are characterized. These form an order ideal which is a simplicial poset, and its rank generating function is computed. Moreover, the permutations whose principal order ideals have a form related to boolean posets are also completely described. It is determined when the set of permutations avoiding a particular set of patter…
Motivated by recent work with Mazorchuk, we characterize the conditions under which the intersection of two principal order ideals in the Bruhat order is boolean. That characterization is presented in three versions: in terms of reduced words, in terms of permutation patterns, and in terms of permutation support. The equivalence of these properties follows from an analysis of what it means to have a specific letter repeated in a permutation's reduced words; namely, that a specific 321-pattern appears.
In this paper we consider the rank generating function of a separable permutation $π$ in the weak Bruhat order on the two intervals $[\text{id}, π]$ and $[π, w_0]$, where $w_0 = n,(n-1),..., 1$. We show a surprising result that the product of these two generating functions is the generating function for the symmetric group with the weak order. We then obtain explicit formulas for the rank generating functions on $[\text{id}, π]$ and $[π, w_0]$, which leads to the rank-symmetry and unimodality of the two graded posets.
The classical Ehresmann-Bruhat order describes the possible degenerations of a pair of flags in a finite-dimensional vector space V; or, equivalently, the closure of an orbit of the group GL(V) acting on the direct product of two full flag varieties. We obtain a similar result for triples consisting of two subspaces and a partial flag in V; this is equivalent to describing the closure of a GL(V)-orbit in the product of two Grassmannians and one flag variety. We give a rank criterion to check whether such a triple can be degenerated to another one, and we classify the minimal degenerations. Our…
We introduce two order relations on finite Coxeter groups which refine the absolute and the Bruhat order, and establish some of their main properties. In particular we study the restriction of these orders to noncrossing partitions and show that the intervals for these orders can be enumerated in terms of the cluster complex. The properties of our orders permit to revisit several results in Coxeter combinatorics, such as the Chapoton triangles and how they are related, the enumeration of reflections with full support, the bijections between clusters and noncrossing partitions.
We extend the weak Bruhat order of a finite Coxeter group to the set of its coclasses, modulo parabolic standard subgroups. We use this order to describe associative algebra structures on the vector spaces spanned by the faces of permutahedra on one side, and on the vector space spanned by the planar rooted trees, on the other one.
In this note, we introduce a statistic on Motzkin paths that describes the rank generating function of Bruhat order for involutions. Our proof relies on a bijection introduced by Philippe Biane from permutations to certain labeled Motzkin paths and a recently introduced interpretation of this rank generating function in terms of visible inversions. By restricting our identity to fixed-point-free (FPF) involutions, we recover an identity due to Louis Billera, Lionel Levine and Karola Mészáros with a previous bijective proof by Matthew Watson. Our work sheds new light on the Ethiopian dinner gam…
The poset of permutations of [n] under Bruhat ordering is studied. We give nontrivial upper and lower bounds for the number of comparable pairs of permutations in both the weak and strong versions of this order. In light of numerical experiments, we conjecture that in either case the upper bound is qualitatively close to the actual number of comparable pairs.
An element $w$ of the Weyl group is called rationally smooth if the corresponding Schubert variety is rationally smooth. This happens exactly when the lower interval $[id,w]$ in the Bruhat order is palindromic. For each element $w$ of the Weyl group, we construct a certain hyperplane arrangement. After analyzing the palindromic intervals inside the maximal quotients, we use this result to show that the generating function for regions of the arrangement coincides with the Poincaré polynomial of the corresponding Schubert variety if and only if the Schubert variety is rationally smooth.
Motivated by the geometry of certain hyperplane arrangements, Manin and Schechtman defined for each positive integer n a hierarchy of finite partially ordered sets B(n, k), indexed by positive integers k, called the higher Bruhat orders. The poset B(n, 1) is naturally identified with the weak left Bruhat order on the symmetric group S_n, each B(n, k) has a unique maximal and a unique minimal element, and the poset B(n, k + 1) can be constructed from the set of maximal chains in B(n, k). Elias has demonstrated a striking connection between the posets B(n, k) for k = 2 and the diagrammatics of B…
For each permutation $w$, we can construct a collection of hyperplanes $\mathcal{A}_w$ according to the inversions of $w$, which is called the inversion hyperplane arrangement associated to $w$. It was conjectured by Postnikov and confirmed by Hultman, Linusson, Shareshian and Sjöstrand that the number of regions of $\mathcal{A}_w$ is less than or equal to the number of permutations below $w$ in the Bruhat order, with the equality holds if and only if $w$ avoids the four patterns 4231, 35142, 42513 and 351624. In this paper, we show that the number of regions of $\mathcal{A}_w$ is greater than…
Let $W$ be a finite coxeter group, let $W_I$, $W_J$ be standard parabolic subgroups, let $u$, $v$ be minimal double cosets representatives of double cosets in $W_I W / W_J$ and let $u'$, $v'$ be the maximal representatives of those same two cosets. We show that $u < v$ if and only if $u' < v'$ for the Bruhat order.
The order complex of inclusion poset $PF_n$ of Borel orbit closures in skew-symmetric matrices is investigated. It is shown that $PF_n$ is an EL-shellable poset, and furthermore, its order complex triangulates a ball. The rank-generating function of $PF_n$ is computed and the resulting polynomial is contrasted with the Hasse-Weil zeta function of the variety of skew-symmetric matrices over finite fields.
We study the appearance of notable interval structures -- lattices, modular lattices, distributive lattices, and boolean lattices -- in both the Bruhat and weak orders of Coxeter groups. We collect and expand upon known results for principal order ideals, including pattern characterizations and enumerations for the symmetric group. This segues naturally into a similar analysis for arbitrary intervals, although the results are less characterizing for the Bruhat order at this generality. In counterpoint, however, we obtain a full characterization for intervals starting at rank one in the symmetr…
In theory of Coxeter groups, bigrassmannian elements are well known as elements which have precisely one left descent and precisely one right descent. In this article, we prove formulas on enumeration of bigrassmannian permutations weakly below a permutation in Bruhat order in the symmetric groups. For the proof, we use equivalent characterizations of bigrassmannian permutations by Lascoux-Schutzenberger and Reading.
In recent work, the authors used an order lowering operator $\nabla$, introduced by Stanley, to prove the strong Sperner property for the weak Bruhat order on the symmetric group. Hamaker, Pechenik, Speyer, and Weigandt interpreted $\nabla$ as a differential operator on Schubert polynomials and used this to prove a new identity for Schubert polynomials and a determinant conjecture of Stanley. In this paper we study a raising operator $Δ$ for the \emph{strong} Bruhat order, which is in many ways dual to $\nabla$. We prove a Schubert identity dual to that of Hamaker et al. and derive formulas fo…
We present a partial generalization to Schubert calculus on flag varieties of the classical Littlewood-Richardson rule, in its version based on Schuetzenberger's jeu de taquin. More precisely, we describe certain structure constants expressing the product of a Schubert and a Schur polynomial. We use a generalization of Fomin's growth diagrams (for chains in Young's lattice of partitions) to chains of permutations in the so-called k-Bruhat order. Our work is based on the recent thesis of Beligan, in which he generalizes the classical plactic structure on words to chains in certain intervals in …
