Brendan Pawlowski
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Cohomology classes of rank varieties and a counterexample to a conjecture of Liu
dmtcs:2462 -
Discrete Mathematics & Theoretical Computer Science,
January 1, 2015,
DMTCS Proceedings, 27th International Conference on Formal Power Series and Algebraic Combinatorics (FPSAC 2015)
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https://doi.org/10.46298/dmtcs.2462
Cohomology classes of rank varieties and a counterexample to a conjecture of LiuConference paper
Authors: Brendan Pawlowski 1
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Brendan Pawlowski
1 Department of Mathematics [Minneapolis]
To each finite subset of a discrete grid N×N (a diagram), one can associate a subvariety of a complex Grassmannian (a diagram variety), and a representation of a symmetric group (a Specht module). Liu has conjectured that the cohomology class of a diagram variety is represented by the Frobenius characteristic of the corresponding Specht module. We give a counterexample to this conjecture.However, we show that for the diagram variety of a permutation diagram, Liu's conjectured cohomology class σ is at least an upper bound on the actual class τ, in the sense that σ−τ is a nonnegative linear combination of Schubert classes. To do this, we consider a degeneration of Coskun's rank varieties which contains the appropriate diagram variety as a component. Rank varieties are instances of Knutson-Lam-Speyer's positroid varieties, whose cohomology classes are represented by affine Stanley symmetric functions. We show that the cohomology class of a rank variety is in fact represented by an ordinary Stanley symmetric function.