On the Tutte-Krushkal-Renardy polynomial for cell complexes

Abstract

Recently V. Krushkal and D. Renardy generalized the Tutte polynomial from graphs to cell complexes. We show that evaluating this polynomial at the origin gives the number of cellular spanning trees in the sense of A. Duval, C. Klivans, and J. Martin. Moreover, after a slight modification, the Tutte-Krushkal-Renardy polynomial evaluated at the origin gives a weighted count of cellular spanning trees, and therefore its free term can be calculated by the cellular matrix-tree theorem of Duval et al. In the case of cell decompositions of a sphere, this modified polynomial satisfies the same duality identity as the original polynomial. We find that evaluating the Tutte-Krushkal-Renardy along a certain line gives the Bott polynomial. Finally we prove skein relations for the Tutte-Krushkal-Renardy polynomial..Comment: Minor revision according to a reviewer comments. To appear in the Journal of Combinatorial Theory, Series