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Miklós Bóna

Publications and source records attributed to Miklós Bóna.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
arXiv2026

Benchmarks in Leipzig

Between April 1 and May 15, 2026, a group of 49 mathematicians compiled a dataset of research-level mathematics questions with known answers. Most of the work was done during the three-day workshop Benchmarks in Leipzig with 35 participants at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences in Leipzig, Germany. We present the resulting collection of 100~questions. We evaluated these questions in three stages: a single attempt by five state-of-the-art LLMs and their predecessors, followed by a 20-runs-per-model evaluation with three of these models, and finally a 3-run attempt with two heavy-thinking models. After Stage 1, 41 questions remained completely unsolved; after Stage 2, this count dropped to 16; and we concluded Stage 3 with only 2 unsolved questions. This demonstrates that the mathematical reasoning capabilities of LLMs are becoming impressive. In September 2026, we added a fourth stage in which the next generation of models attempted all 100 questions once more, after which only 1 question remains unsolved.

math.HO↗
arXiv2026

Letter frequency in shifts of finite type with one forbidden word

This work considers combinatorial and statistical aspects of {\em{shifts of finite type}}, which are families of words over a finite alphabet which avoid a fixed class of {\emph{forbidden}} sub-words. The overarching question we are interested in is: how do local statistics of a uniformly random element of the shift space depend on combinatorial features of the forbidden set? We focus on the binary alphabet $\{0,1\}$, the class of shift spaces where a single pattern is forbidden, and the average frequency of $1$s (equivalently, the probability of observing $1$ at a given position). In this case, the relevant combinatorial information is encoded by a two-variable auto-correlation polynomial associated to the forbidden word, which we call the {\em{border polynomial}}. We present several results and examples characterizing the ordering of all words by their letter frequencies: for example, we describe the set of patterns which, when forbidden, cause the frequency of $1$s to increase, decrease, or stay exactly $1/2$. Our methodologies include novel explicit local injections and bijections, generating function analysis, and a connection with a probabilistic notion of letter frequency.

math.CO↗
arXiv2026

Boolean--Eulerian numbers

We study decreasing binary trees in which every vertex with two children is colored red or blue. We construct two bijections. The first, to ordered set partitions into odd-sized blocks each arranged as an alternating permutation, shows that the exponential generating function of these trees is $1/(1-\tan z)$. The second, to nonplane decreasing 1-2 trees paired with a binary label on each non-root vertex, proves combinatorially that the count equals $2^{n-1}$ times the~$n$th Euler number. Refining by the number of right edges yields the Boolean--Eulerian polynomials, which are an explicit algebraic transform of the classical Eulerian polynomials. The Foata--Strehl orbit decomposition, recast in the decreasing-binary-tree model, gives a direct combinatorial proof of gamma-positivity, and the algebraic transform carries real-rootedness and interlacing of zeros from the Eulerian polynomials to the Boolean--Eulerian polynomials.

math.CO↗
arXiv2025

A combinatorial proof of a symmetry for a refinement of the Narayana numbers

We establish a tantalizing symmetry of certain numbers refining the Narayana numbers. In terms of Dyck paths, this symmetry is interpreted in the following way: if $w_{n,k,m}$ is the number of Dyck paths of semilength $n$ with $k$ occurrences of $UD$ and $m$ occurrences of $UUD$, then $w_{2k+1,k,m}=w_{2k+1,k,k+1-m}$. We give a combinatorial proof of this fact, relying on the cycle lemma, and showing that the numbers $w_{2k+1,k,m}$ are multiples of the Narayana numbers. We prove a more general fact establishing a relationship between the numbers $w_{n,k,m}$ and a family of generalized Narayana numbers due to Callan. A closed-form expression for the even more general numbers $w_{n,k_{1},k_{2},\ldots , k_{r}}$ counting the semilength-$n$ Dyck paths with $k_{1}$ $UD$-factors, $k_{2}$ $UUD$-factors, $\ldots$ , and $k_{r}$ $U^{r}D$-factors is also obtained, as well as a more general form of the discussed symmetry for these numbers in the case when all rise runs are of certain minimal length. Finally, we investigate properties of the polynomials $W_{n,k}(t)= \sum_{m=0}^k w_{n,k,m} t^m$, including real-rootedness, $γ$-positivity, and a symmetric decomposition.

math.CO↗
arXiv2022

Permutations avoiding sets of patterns with long monotone subsequences

We enumerate permutations that avoid all but one of the $k$ patterns of length $k$ starting with a monotone increasing subsequence of length $k-1$. We compare the size of such permutation classes to the size of the class of permutations avoiding the monotone increasing subsequence of length $k-1$.

math.CO↗
arXiv2022

Random increasing plane trees: asymptotic enumeration of vertices by distance from leaves

We prove that for any fixed $k$, the probability that a random vertex of a random increasing plane tree is of rank $k$, that is, the probability that a random vertex is at distance $k$ from the leaves, converges to a constant $c_k$ as the size $n$ of the tree goes to infinity. {\color{blue} We prove that $1-\sum_{j\le k} c_k<\tfrac{3^{k+1}}{(2k+1)!}$, so that the tail of the limiting rank distribution is super-exponentially narrow. We prove that the latter property holds uniformly for all finite $n$ as well.} More generally, we prove that the ranks of a finite uniformly random set of vertices are asymptotically independent, each with distribution $\{c_k\}$. We compute the exact value of $c_k$ for $0\leq k\leq 3$, demonstrating that the limiting expected fraction of vertices with rank $\le 3$ is $0.9997\dots$. We show that with probability $1-n^{-0.99\eps}$ the highest rank of a vertex in the tree is sandwiched between $(1-\eps)\log n /\log\log n$ and $(1.5+\eps)\log n/\log\log n$, {\color{blue} and that this rank is asymptotic to $\log n/\log\log n$ with probability $1-o(1)$.}

math.CO↗
arXiv2021

Permutations with exactly one copy of a decreasing pattern of length k

We construct an injection from the set of permutations of length $n$ that contain exactly one copy of the decreasing pattern of length $k$ to the set of permutations of length $n+2$ that avoid that pattern. We then prove that the generating function counting the former is not rational, and in the case when $k$ is even and $k\geq 4$, it is not even algebraic. We extend our injection and our nonrationality result to a larger class of patterns.

math.CO↗
arXiv2019

Most principal permutation classes have nonrational generating functions

We prove that for any fixed $n$, and for most permutation patterns $q$, the number $\textup{Av}_{n,\ell}(q)$ of $q$-avoiding permutations of length $n$ that consist of $\ell$ skew blocks is a monotone decreasing function of $\ell$. We then show that this implies that for most patterns $q$, the generating function $\sum_{n\geq 0} \textup{Av}_n(q)z^n$ of the sequence $\textup{Av}_n(q)$ of the numbers of $q$-avoiding permutations is not rational. Placing our results in a broader context, we show that for rational power series $F(z)$ and $G(z)$ with nonnegative real coefficients, the relation $F(z)=1/(1-G(z))$ is supercritical, while for most permutation patterns $q$, the corresponding relation is not supercritical.

math.CO↗
arXiv2015

Longest increasing subsequences and log concavity

Let $π$ be a permutation of $[n]=\{1,\dots,n\}$ and denote by $\ell(π)$ the length of a longest increasing subsequence of $π$. Let $\ell_{n,k}$ be the number of permutations $π$ of $[n]$ with $\ell(π)=k$. Chen conjectured that the sequence $\ell_{n,1},\ell_{n,2},\dots,\ell_{n,n}$ is log concave for every fixed positive integer $n$. We conjecture that the same is true if one is restricted to considering involutions and we show that these two conjectures are closely related. We also prove various analogues of these conjectures concerning permutations whose output tableaux under the Robinson-Schensted algorithm have certain shapes. In addition, we present a proof of Deift that part of the limiting distribution is log concave. Various other conjectures are discussed.

math.CO↗
arXiv2015

Real Zeros and Partitions without singleton blocks

We prove that the generating polynomials of partitions of an $n$-element set into non-singleton blocks, counted by the number of blocks, have real roots only and we study the asymptotic behavior of the leftmost roots. We apply this information to find the most likely number of blocks.

math.CO↗
arXiv2015

Log-concavity, the Ulam distance and involutions

We prove that in a large collection of naturally defined sets of permutations of fixed length, the numbers of permutations at Ulam distance k from the identity form a log-concave sequence in k.

math.CO↗
arXiv2014

Pattern-Avoiding Involutions: Exact and Asymptotic Enumeration

We consider the enumeration of pattern-avoiding involutions, focusing in particular on sets defined by avoiding a single pattern of length 4. As we demonstrate, the numerical data for these problems demonstrates some surprising behavior. This strange behavior even provides some very unexpected data related to the number of 1324-avoiding permutations.

math.CO↗
arXiv2006

On the Enumeration of Certain Weighted Graphs

We enumerate weighted graphs with a certain upper bound condition. We also compute the generating function of the numbers of these graphs, and prove that it is a rational function. In particular, we show that if the given graph is a bipartite graph, then its generating function is of the form $\frac{p(x)}{(1-x)^{m+1}}$, where $m$ is the number of vertices of the graph and $p(x)$ is a polynomial of degree at most $m$.

math.CO↗
arXiv2002

Two injective proofs of a conjecture of Simion

Simion conjectured the unimodality of a sequence counting lattice paths in a grid with a Ferrers diagram removed from the northwest corner. Recently, Hildebrand and then Wang proved the stronger result that this sequence is actually log concave. Both proofs were mainly algebraic in nature. We give two combinatorial proofs of this theorem.

math.CO↗