• 1 Department of Mathematics [Cornell]
• 2 Department of Mathematics [Innsbruck]

Define the interval rank $r_[i,j] : Gr_k(\mathbb C^n) →\mathbb{N}$ of a k-plane V as the dimension of the orthogonal projection $π _[i,j](V)$ of V to the $(j-i+1)$-dimensional subspace that uses the coordinates $i,i+1,\ldots,j$. By measuring all these ranks, we define the interval rank stratification of the Grassmannian $Gr_k(\mathbb C^n)$. It is finer than the Schubert and Richardson stratifications, and coarser than the positroid stratification studied by Lusztig, Postnikov, and others, so we call the closures of these strata interval positroid varieties. We connect Vakil's "geometric Littlewood-Richardson rule", in which he computed the homology classes of Richardson varieties (Schubert varieties intersected with opposite Schubert varieties), to Erdős-Ko-Rado shifting, and show that all of Vakil's varieties are interval positroid varieties. We build on his work in three ways: (1) we extend it to arbitrary interval positroid varieties, (2) we use it to compute in equivariant K-theory, not just homology, and (3) we simplify Vakil's (2+1)-dimensional "checker games" to 2-dimensional diagrams we call "IP pipe dreams". The ring Symm of symmetric functions and its basis of Schur functions is well-known to be very closely related to the ring $\bigoplus_a,b H_*(Gr_a(\mathbb{C}^{(a+b)})$ and its basis of Schubert classes. We extend the latter ring to equivariant K-theory (with respect to a circle action on each $\mathbb{C}^{(a+b)}$, and compute the structure constants of this two-parameter deformation of Symm using the interval positroid technology above.