Avoidance of Partitions of a Three-element Set

Klazar defined and studied a notion of pattern avoidance for set partitions, which is an analogue of pattern avoidance for permutations. Sagan considered partitions which avoid a single partition of three elements. We enumerate partitions which avoid any family of partitions of a 3-element set as was done by Simion and Schmidt for permutations. We also consider even and odd set partitions. We provide enumerative results for set partitions restricted by generalized set partition patterns, which are an analogue of the generalized permutation patterns of Babson and Steingr{\'{\i}}msson. Finally, in the spirit of work done by Babson and Steingr{'{\i}}msson, we will show how these generalized partition patterns can be used to describe set partition statistics.Comment: 23 pages, 2 tables, 1 figure, to appear in Advances in Applied Mathematic

Permutation patterns and statistics

Let S_n denote the symmetric group of all permutations of the set {1, 2, ...,n} and let S = \cup_{n\ge0} S_n. If Pi is a set of permutations, then we let Av_n(Pi) be the set of permutations in S_n which avoid every permutation of Pi in the sense of pattern avoidance. One of the celebrated notions in pattern theory is that of Wilf-equivalence, where Pi and Pi' are Wilf equivalent if #Av_n(Pi)=#Av_n(Pi') for all n\ge0. In a recent paper, Sagan and Savage proposed studying a q-analogue of this concept defined as follows. Suppose st:S->N is a permutation statistic where N represents the nonnegative integers. Consider the corresponding generating function, F_n^{st}(Pi;q) = sum_{sigma in Av_n(Pi)} q^{st sigma}, and call Pi,Pi' st-Wilf equivalent if F_n^{st}(Pi;q)=F_n^{st}(Pi';q) for all n\ge0. We present the first in-depth study of this concept for the inv and maj statistics. In particular, we determine all inv- and maj-Wilf equivalences for any Pi containd in S_3. This leads us to consider various q-analogues of the Catalan numbers, Fibonacci numbers, triangular numbers, and powers of two. Our proof techniques use lattice paths, integer partitions, and Foata's fundamental bijection. We also answer a question about Mahonian pairs raised in the Sagan-Savage article.Comment: 28 pages, 5 figures, tightened up the exposition, noted that some of the conjectures have been prove

Mahonian Pairs

We introduce the notion of a Mahonian pair. Consider the set, P^*, of all words having the positive integers as alphabet. Given finite subsets S,T of P^*, we say that (S,T) is a Mahonian pair if the distribution of the major index, maj, over S is the same as the distribution of the inversion number, inv, over T. So the well-known fact that maj and inv are equidistributed over the symmetric group, S_n, can be expressed by saying that (S_n,S_n) is a Mahonian pair. We investigate various Mahonian pairs (S,T) with S different from T. Our principal tool is Foata's fundamental bijection f: P^* -> P^* since it has the property that maj w = inv f(w) for any word w. We consider various families of words associated with Catalan and Fibonacci numbers. We show that, when restricted to words in {1,2}^*, f transforms familiar statistics on words into natural statistics on integer partitions such as the size of the Durfee square. The Rogers-Ramanujan identities, the Catalan triangle, and various q-analogues also make an appearance. We generalize the definition of Mahonian pairs to infinite sets and use this as a tool to connect a partition bijection of Corteel-Savage-Venkatraman with the Greene-Kleitman decomposition of a Boolean algebra into symmetric chains. We close with comments about future work and open problems.Comment: Minor changes suggested by the referees and updated status of the problem of finding new Mahonian pairs; [email protected] and [email protected]

In Praise of an Elementary Identity of Euler

We survey the applications of an elementary identity used by Euler in one of his proofs of the Pentagonal Number Theorem. Using a suitably reformulated version of this identity that we call Euler's Telescoping Lemma, we give alternate proofs of all the key summation theorems for terminating Hypergeometric Series and Basic Hypergeometric Series, including the terminating Binomial Theorem, the Chu--Vandermonde sum, the Pfaff--Saalch\" utz sum, and their $q$-analogues. We also give a proof of Jackson's $q$-analog of Dougall's sum, the sum of a terminating, balanced, very-well-poised $_8\phi_7$ sum. Our proofs are conceptually the same as those obtained by the WZ method, but done without using a computer. We survey identities for Generalized Hypergeometric Series given by Macdonald, and prove several identities for $q$-analogs of Fibonacci numbers and polynomials and Pell numbers that have appeared in combinatorial contexts. Some of these identities appear to be new.Comment: Published versio