Tuesday, 13 April 2010

co.combinatorics - Generating functions for certain statistics on Coxeter groups of type B

Background



In combinatorics one is sometimes interested in various 'statistics'
on a Coxeter group (e.g., functions from the group to the natural
numbers), and to find a 'nice' expression for a corresponding generating
function. For example, the length function l on a Coxeter group
W is an important statistic, and when W=Sn is the symmetric
group on n letters, a classical result of this type is the identity
sumwinSntl(w)=prodni=1frac1ti1t,



where t is an indeterminate (cf. Stanley, Enumerative Combinatorics,
vol. 1, Coroll. 1.3.10). There are also variations on the problem,
where one considers sums over elements w whose right descent set



DR(w):=xinWmidl(wx)<l(w)



is contained in a given subset IsubseteqS of the fundamental
reflections S of the group W. There are several examples in
the literature of sums of the form
sumsubstackwinW DR(w)subseteqItf(w)quadtextorsumsubstackwinW DR(w)subseteqI(1)l(w)tf(w),



where f:WrightarrowmathbbN is a given statistic on W, and
it is sometimes possible to express these generating functions in
a (non-trivial) simple algebraic way, as in the above example.



Let [n] denote the set 1,2,dots,n, and let SBn
be the signed permutation group, that is, the group of all bijections
w of the set [pmn]=pm1,pm2,dots,pmn, such that w(a)=a,
for all a in the set (cf. Björner & Brenti: Combinatorics of Coxeter
Groups, 8.1). If winSBn, we write w=[a1,dots,an]
to mean w(i)=ai, for i=1,dots,n. For iin[n1], the ith
Coxeter generator of SBn is given by
si:=[1,dots,i1,i+1,i,i+2,dots,n],


and we also put
s0:=[1,2,dots,n].



We may therefore identify the set of generators si with the
set [n1]0:=[n1]cup0. Hence, for any subset Isubseteq[n1]0,
we write DR(w)subseteqI rather than DR(w)subseteqsimidiinI.



Questions



In addition to defining a collection of generators, a set I=i1,dots,ilsubseteq[n1]0,
with i1<i2<cdots<il also defines the following polynomial
(related to Gaussian polynomials):



alphaI,n(t):=frac(underlinen)!(underlinei1)!prodlr=1prodlfloor(ir+1ir)/2rfloors=1(underline2s).



Here lfloorcdotrfloor denotes the floor function, and we use
the notation (underline0):=1, (underlinea):=1ta, for
ageq1, and (underlinea)!:=(underline1)(underline2)cdots(underlinea).
To get a correct formula, we also put il+1:=n.}



Define the following statistic on SBn:
tildeL(w):=frac12|x,yin[pmn]midx<y,w(x)>w(y),xnotequivypmod2|.



The question is now:




Is it true that for any n and I as above, we have



alphaI,n(t)=sumsubstackwinSBn DR(w)subseteqI(1)l(w)ttildeL(w)?




A less precise but more general question is the following: Given a
family of polynomials pI,n(t)inmathbfZ[t] depending on I
and n, is there any general (non-trivial) sufficient criterion
for the existence of functions f,g:WrightarrowmathbbN on a
finite Coxeter group W, such that for all I and n, we have



pI,n(t)=sumsubstackwinW DR(w)subseteqIaf(w)tg(w),


for some ainmathbfZ?

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