Simple formulas for lattice paths avoiding certain periodic staircase boundaries

There is a strikingly simple classical formula for the number of lattice paths avoiding the line x = ky when k is a positive integer. We show that the natural generalization of this simple formula continues to hold when the line x = ky is replaced by certain periodic staircase boundaries--but only under special conditions. The simple formula fails in general, and it remains an open question to what extent our results can be further generalized.Comment: Accepted version (JCTA); proof of Corollary 7 expanded, and 2 new refs adde

Two operators on sandpile configurations, the sandpile model on the complete bipartite graph, and a Cyclic Lemma

We introduce two operators on stable configurations of the sandpile model that provide an algorithmic bijection between recurrent and parking configurations. This bijection preserves their equivalence classes with respect to the sandpile group. The study of these operators in the special case of the complete bipartite graph ${K}_{m,n}$ naturally leads to a generalization of the well known Cyclic Lemma of Dvoretsky and Motzkin, via pairs of periodic bi-infinite paths in the plane having slightly different slopes. We achieve our results by interpreting the action of these operators as an action on a point in the grid $\mathbb{Z}^2$ which is pointed to by one of these pairs of paths. Our Cyclic lemma allows us to enumerate several classes of polyominoes, and therefore builds on the work of Irving and Rattan (2009), Chapman et al. (2009), and Bonin et al. (2003).Comment: 28 page

Symmetries of statistics on lattice paths between two boundaries

We prove that on the set of lattice paths with steps N=(0,1) and E=(1,0) that lie between two fixed boundaries T and B (which are themselves lattice paths), the statistics `number of E steps shared with B' and `number of E steps shared with T' have a symmetric joint distribution. To do so, we give an involution that switches these statistics, preserves additional parameters, and generalizes to paths that contain steps S=(0,-1) at prescribed x-coordinates. We also show that a similar equidistribution result for path statistics follows from the fact that the Tutte polynomial of a matroid is independent of the order of its ground set. We extend the two theorems to k-tuples of paths between two boundaries, and we give some applications to Dyck paths, generalizing a result of Deutsch, to watermelon configurations, to pattern-avoiding permutations, and to the generalized Tamari lattice. Finally, we prove a conjecture of Nicol\'as about the distribution of degrees of k consecutive vertices in k-triangulations of a convex n-gon. To achieve this goal, we provide a new statistic-preserving bijection between certain k-tuples of non-crossing paths and k-flagged semistandard Young tableaux, which is based on local moves reminiscent of jeu de taquin.Comment: Small typos corrected, and journal reference and grant info adde