Permutation Patterns

section

33 articles

Years

2019

2018

2017

2016

This section handles the special issue of DMTCS for 13th International Permutation Patterns conference that has been held in London, UK, 15-19 June. https://sites.google.com/site/pp2015london/ Special guest editors are Jonathan Bloom Mathilde Bouvel Robert Brignall

33 articles

Article

Prolific Compositions

Murray Tannock, Michael Albert

Abstract

Under what circumstances might every extension of a combinatorial structure contain more copies of another one than the original did? This property, which we call prolificity, holds universally in some cases (e.g., finite linear orders) and only trivially in others (e.g., permutations). Integer compositions, or equivalently layered permutations, provide a middle ground. In that setting, there are prolific compositions for a given pattern if and only if that pattern begins and ends with 1. For each pattern, there is an easily constructed automaton that recognises prolific compositions for that pattern. Some instances where there is a unique minimal prolific composition for a pattern are classified.

Published on December 13, 2019

Article

Cyclic permutations avoiding pairs of patterns of length three

Miklos Bona, Michael Cory

Abstract

We complete the enumeration of cyclic permutations avoiding two patterns of length three each by providing explicit formulas for all but one of the pairs for which no such formulas were known. The pair $(123,231)$ proves to be the most difficult of these pairs. We also prove a lower bound for the growth rate of the number of cyclic permutations that avoid a single pattern $q$, where $q$ is an element of a certain infinite family of patterns. Comment: 15 pages, two figures

Published on November 26, 2019

Article

Enumeration of super-strong Wilf equivalence classes of permutations in the generalized factor order

Ioannis Michos, Christina Savvidou

Abstract

Super-strong Wilf equivalence classes of the symmetric group ${\mathcal S}_n$ on $n$ letters, with respect to the generalized factor order, were shown by Hadjiloucas, Michos and Savvidou (2018) to be in bijection with pyramidal sequences of consecutive differences. In this article we enumerate the latter by giving recursive formulae in terms of a two-dimensional analogue of non-interval permutations. As a by-product, we obtain a recursively defined set of representatives of super-strong Wilf equivalence classes in ${\mathcal S}_n$. We also provide a connection between super-strong Wilf equivalence and the geometric notion of shift equivalence---originally defined by Fidler, Glasscock, Miceli, Pantone, and Xu (2018) for words---by showing that an alternate way to characterize super-strong Wilf equivalence for permutations is by keeping only rigid shifts in the definition of shift equivalence. This allows us to fully describe shift equivalence classes for permutations of size $n$ and enumerate them, answering the corresponding problem posed by Fidler, Glasscock, Miceli, Pantone, and Xu (2018). Comment: 18 pages, 5 tables

Published on November 11, 2019

Article

Classical pattern distributions in $\mathcal{S}_{n}(132)$ and $\mathcal{S}_{n}(123)$

Dun Qiu, Jeffrey Remmel

Abstract

Classical pattern avoidance and occurrence are well studied in the symmetric group $\mathcal{S}_{n}$. In this paper, we provide explicit recurrence relations to the generating functions counting the number of classical pattern occurrence in the set of 132-avoiding permutations and the set of 123-avoiding permutations. Comment: 23 pages, 5 fugures

Published on November 4, 2019

Article

Pattern Avoidance for Random Permutations

Harry Crane, Stephen DeSalvo

Abstract

Using techniques from Poisson approximation, we prove explicit error bounds on the number of permutations that avoid any pattern. Most generally, we bound the total variation distance between the joint distribution of pattern occurrences and a corresponding joint distribution of independent Bernoulli random variables, which as a corollary yields a Poisson approximation for the distribution of the number of occurrences of any pattern. We also investigate occurrences of consecutive patterns in random Mallows permutations, of which uniform random permutations are a special case. These bounds allow us to estimate the probability that a pattern occurs any number of times and, in particular, the probability that a random permutation avoids a given pattern. Comment: 24 pages, 2 Figures, 4 Tables

Published on December 4, 2018

Article

Pattern Avoidance in Reverse Double Lists

Monica Anderson, Marika Diepenbroek, Lara Pudwell, Alex Stoll

Abstract

In this paper, we consider pattern avoidance in a subset of words on $\{1,1,2,2,\dots,n,n\}$ called reverse double lists. In particular a reverse double list is a word formed by concatenating a permutation with its reversal. We enumerate reverse double lists avoiding any permutation pattern of length at most 4 and completely determine the corresponding Wilf classes. For permutation patterns $\rho$ of length 5 or more, we characterize when the number of $\rho$-avoiding reverse double lists on $n$ letters has polynomial growth. We also determine the number of $1\cdots k$-avoiders of maximum length for any positive integer $k$. Comment: 24 pages, 5 figures, 4 tables

Published on October 29, 2018

Article

Quadrant marked mesh patterns in 123-avoiding permutations

Dun Qiu, Jeffrey B. Remmel

Abstract

Given a permutation $\sigma = \sigma_1 \ldots \sigma_n$ in the symmetric group $\mathcal{S}_{n}$, we say that $\sigma_i$ matches the quadrant marked mesh pattern $\mathrm{MMP}(a,b,c,d)$ in $\sigma$ if there are at least $a$ points to the right of $\sigma_i$ in $\sigma$ which are greater than $\sigma_i$, at least $b$ points to the left of $\sigma_i$ in $\sigma$ which are greater than $\sigma_i$, at least $c$ points to the left of $\sigma_i$ in $\sigma$ which are smaller than $\sigma_i$, and at least $d$ points to the right of $\sigma_i$ in $\sigma$ which are smaller than $\sigma_i$. Kitaev, Remmel, and Tiefenbruck systematically studied the distribution of the number of matches of $\mathrm{MMP}(a,b,c,d)$ in 132-avoiding permutations. The operation of reverse and complement on permutations allow one to translate their results to find the distribution of the number of $\mathrm{MMP}(a,b,c,d)$ matches in 231-avoiding, 213-avoiding, and 312-avoiding permutations. In this paper, we study the distribution of the number of matches of $\mathrm{MMP}(a,b,c,d)$ in 123-avoiding permutations. We provide explicit recurrence relations to enumerate our objects which can be used to give closed forms for the generating functions associated with such distributions. In many cases, we provide combinatorial explanations of the coefficients that appear in our generating functions.

Published on August 3, 2018

Article

Expected Number of Distinct Subsequences in Randomly Generated Binary Strings

Yonah Biers-Ariel, Anant Godbole, Elizabeth Kelley

Abstract

When considering binary strings, it's natural to wonder how many distinct subsequences might exist in a given string. Given that there is an existing algorithm which provides a straightforward way to compute the number of distinct subsequences in a fixed string, we might next be interested in the expected number of distinct subsequences in random strings. This expected value is already known for random binary strings where each letter in the string is, independently, equally likely to be a 1 or a 0. We generalize this result to random strings where the letter 1 appears independently with probability $\alpha \in [0,1]$. Also, we make some progress in the case of random strings from an arbitrary alphabet as well as when the string is generated by a two-state Markov chain. Comment: 10 pages

Published on June 26, 2018

Article

Continued fractions for permutation statistics

Sergi Elizalde

Abstract

We explore a bijection between permutations and colored Motzkin paths that has been used in different forms by Foata and Zeilberger, Biane, and Corteel. By giving a visual representation of this bijection in terms of so-called cycle diagrams, we find simple translations of some statistics on permutations (and subsets of permutations) into statistics on colored Motzkin paths, which are amenable to the use of continued fractions. We obtain new enumeration formulas for subsets of permutations with respect to fixed points, excedances, double excedances, cycles, and inversions. In particular, we prove that cyclic permutations whose excedances are increasing are counted by the Bell numbers. Comment: final version formatted for DMTCS

Published on June 25, 2018

Article

A Central Limit Theorem for Vincular Permutation Patterns

Lisa Hofer

Abstract

We study the number of occurrences of any fixed vincular permutation pattern. We show that this statistics on uniform random permutations is asymptotically normal and describe the speed of convergence. To prove this central limit theorem, we use the method of dependency graphs. The main difficulty is then to estimate the variance of our statistics. We need a lower bound on the variance, for which we introduce a recursive technique based on the law of total variance. Comment: only journal style changes, same content as in v3

Published on March 26, 2018

Article

Asymptotic results on Klazar set partition avoidance

Ryan Alweiss

Abstract

We establish asymptotic bounds for the number of partitions of $[n]$ avoiding a given partition in Klazar's sense, obtaining the correct answer to within an exponential for the block case. This technique also enables us to establish a general lower bound. Additionally, we consider a graph theoretic restatement of partition avoidance problems, and propose several conjectures.

Published on March 19, 2018

Article

On consecutive pattern-avoiding permutations of length 4, 5 and beyond

Nicholas R Beaton, Andrew R Conway, Anthony J Guttmann

Abstract

We review and extend what is known about the generating functions for consecutive pattern-avoiding permutations of length 4, 5 and beyond, and their asymptotic behaviour. There are respectively, seven length-4 and twenty-five length-5 consecutive-Wilf classes. D-finite differential equations are known for the reciprocal of the exponential generating functions for four of the length-4 and eight of the length-5 classes. We give the solutions of some of these ODEs. An unsolved functional equation is known for one more class of length-4, length-5 and beyond. We give the solution of this functional equation, and use it to show that the solution is not D-finite. For three further length-5 c-Wilf classes we give recurrences for two and a differential-functional equation for a third. For a fourth class we find a new algebraic solution. We give a polynomial-time algorithm to generate the coefficients of the generating functions which is faster than existing algorithms, and use this to (a) calculate the asymptotics for all classes of length 4 and length 5 to significantly greater precision than previously, and (b) use these extended series to search, unsuccessfully, for D-finite solutions for the unsolved classes, leading us to conjecture that the solutions are not D-finite. We have also searched, unsuccessfully, for differentially algebraic solutions. Comment: 23 pages, 2 figures (update of references, plus web link to enumeration data). Minor update. Typos corrected. One additional reference

Published on February 26, 2018

Article

Equivalence classes of mesh patterns with a dominating pattern

Murray Tannock, Henning Ulfarsson

Abstract

Two mesh patterns are coincident if they are avoided by the same set of permutations, and are Wilf-equivalent if they have the same number of avoiders of each length. We provide sufficient conditions for coincidence of mesh patterns, when only permutations also avoiding a longer classical pattern are considered. Using these conditions we completely classify coincidences between families containing a mesh pattern of length 2 and a classical pattern of length 3. Furthermore, we completely Wilf-classify mesh patterns of length 2 inside the class of 231-avoiding permutations.

Published on February 9, 2018

Article

Improving bounds on packing densities of 4-point permutations

Jakub Sliacan, Walter Stromquist

Abstract

We consolidate what is currently known about packing densities of 4-point permutations and in the process improve the lower bounds for the packing densities of 1324 and 1342. We also provide rigorous upper bounds for the packing densities of 1324, 1342, and 2413. All our bounds are within $10^{-4}$ of the true packing densities. Together with the known bounds, this gives us a fairly complete picture of all 4-point packing densities. We also provide new upper bounds for several small permutations of length at least five. Our main tool for the upper bounds is the framework of flag algebras introduced by Razborov in 2007. Comment: journal style, 18 pages

Published on February 6, 2018

Article

A bijection between the set of nesting-similarity classes and L & P matchings

Megan A. Martinez, Manda Riehl

Abstract

Matchings are frequently used to model RNA secondary structures; however, not all matchings can be realized as RNA motifs. One class of matchings, called the L $\&$ P matchings, is the most restrictive model for RNA secondary structures in the Largest Hairpin Family (LHF). The L $\&$ P matchings were enumerated in $2015$ by Jefferson, and they are equinumerous with the set of nesting-similarity classes of matchings, enumerated by Klazar. We provide a bijection between these two sets. This bijection preserves noncrossing matchings, and preserves the sequence obtained reading left to right of whether an edge begins or ends at that vertex. Comment: 9 pages, 7 figures

Published on January 22, 2018

Article

Best and worst case permutations for random online domination of the path

Christopher Coscia, Jonathan DeWitt, Fan Yang, Yiguang Zhang

Abstract

We study a randomized algorithm for graph domination, by which, according to a uniformly chosen permutation, vertices are revealed and added to the dominating set if not already dominated. We determine the expected size of the dominating set produced by the algorithm for the path graph $P_n$ and use this to derive the expected size for some related families of graphs. We then provide a much-refined analysis of the worst and best cases of this algorithm on $P_n$ and enumerate the permutations for which the algorithm has the worst-possible performance and best-possible performance. The case of dominating the path graph has connections to previous work of Bouwer and Star, and of Gessel on greedily coloring the path. Comment: 13 pages, 1 figure

Published on December 20, 2017

Article

Asymptotic distribution of fixed points of pattern-avoiding involutions

Samuel Miner, Douglas Rizzolo, Erik Slivken

Abstract

For a variety of pattern-avoiding classes, we describe the limiting distribution for the number of fixed points for involutions chosen uniformly at random from that class. In particular we consider monotone patterns of arbitrary length as well as all patterns of length 3. For monotone patterns we utilize the connection with standard Young tableaux with at most $k$ rows and involutions avoiding a monotone pattern of length $k$. For every pattern of length 3 we give the bivariate generating function with respect to fixed points for the involutions that avoid that pattern, and where applicable apply tools from analytic combinatorics to extract information about the limiting distribution from the generating function. Many well-known distributions appear. Comment: 16 pages

Published on December 11, 2017

Article

Splittability and 1-amalgamability of permutation classes

Vít Jelínek, Michal Opler

Abstract

A permutation class $C$ is splittable if it is contained in a merge of two of its proper subclasses, and it is 1-amalgamable if given two permutations $\sigma$ and $\tau$ in $C$, each with a marked element, we can find a permutation $\pi$ in $C$ containing both $\sigma$ and $\tau$ such that the two marked elements coincide. It was previously shown that unsplittability implies 1-amalgamability. We prove that unsplittability and 1-amalgamability are not equivalent properties of permutation classes by showing that the class $Av(1423, 1342)$ is both splittable and 1-amalgamable. Our construction is based on the concept of LR-inflations, which we introduce here and which may be of independent interest. Comment: 17 pages, 7 figures

Published on December 5, 2017

Article

A Bijection on Classes Enumerated by the Schr\"oder Numbers

Michael W. Schroeder, Rebecca Smith

Abstract

We consider a sorting machine consisting of two stacks in series where the first stack has the added restriction that entries in the stack must be in decreasing order from top to bottom. The class of permutations sortable by this machine are known to be enumerated by the Schr\"oder numbers. In this paper, we give a bijection between these sortable permutations of length $n$ and Schr\"oder paths -- the lattice paths from $(0,0)$ to $(n-1,n-1)$ composed of East steps $(1,0)$, North steps $(0,1)$, and Diagonal steps $(1,1)$ that travel weakly below the line $y=x$.

Published on July 19, 2017

Article

The permutation class Av(4213,2143)

David Bevan

Abstract

We determine the structure of permutations avoiding the patterns 4213 and 2143. Each such permutation consists of the skew sum of a sequence of plane trees, together with an increasing sequence of points above and an increasing sequence of points to its left. We use this characterisation to establish the generating function enumerating these permutations. We also investigate the properties of a typical large permutation in the class and prove that if a large permutation that avoids 4213 and 2143 is chosen uniformly at random, then it is more likely than not to avoid 2413 as well. Comment: 14 pages

Published on April 4, 2017