Generating Functions for Inverted Semistandard Young Tableaux and Generalized Ballot Numbers

An inverted semistandard Young tableau is a row-standard tableau along with a collection of inversion pairs that quantify how far the tableau is from being column semistandard. Such a tableau with precisely $k$ inversion pairs is said to be a $k$-inverted semistandard Young tableau. Building upon earlier work by Fresse and the author, this paper develops generating functions for the numbers of $k$-inverted semistandard Young tableau of various shapes $\lambda$ and contents $\mu$. An easily-calculable generating function is given for the number of $k$-inverted semistandard Young tableau that "standardize" to a fixed semistandard Young tableau. For $m$-row shapes $\lambda$ and standard content $\mu$, the total number of $k$-inverted standard Young tableau of shape $\lambda$ are then enumerated by relating such tableaux to $m$-dimensional generalizations of Dyck paths and counting the numbers of "returns to ground" in those paths. In the rectangular specialization of $\lambda = n^m$ this yields a generating function that involves $m$-dimensional analogues of the famed Ballot numbers. Our various results are then used to directly enumerate all $k$-inverted semistandard Young tableaux with arbitrary content and two-row shape $\lambda = a^1 b^1$, as well as all $k$-inverted standard Young tableaux with two-column shape $\lambda=2^n$

Inversions of Semistandard Young Tableaux

A tableau inversion is a pair of entries from the same column of a row-standard tableau that lack the relative ordering necessary to make the tableau column-standard. An $i$-inverted Young tableau is a row-standard tableau with precisely $i$ inversion pairs, and may be interpreted as a generalization of (column-standard) Young tableau. Inverted Young tableau that lack repeated entries were introduced by Fresse to calculate the Betti numbers of Springer fibers in Type A, and were later developed as combinatorial objects in their own right by Beagley and Drube. This paper generalizes earlier notions of tableau inversions to row-standard tableaux with repeated entries, yielding an interesting new generalization of semistandard (as opposed to merely standard) Young tableaux. We develop a closed formula for the maximum numbers of inversion pairs for a row-standard tableau with a specific shape and content, and show that the number of $i$-inverted tableaux of a given shape is invariant under permutation of content. We then enumerate $i$-inverted Young tableaux for a variety of shapes and contents, and generalize an earlier result that places $1$-inverted Young tableaux of a general shape in bijection with $0$-inverted Young tableaux of a variety of related shapes