arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Steven V Sam.
Given r elements in an integral domain over an algebraically closed field such that any two are linearly independent, we show that there is an integer e between 1 and r! such the eth powers of these elements are linearly independent.
Twisted commutative algebras (tca's) have played an important role in the nascent field of representation stability. Let A_d be the complex tca freely generated by d indeterminates of degree 1. In a previous paper, we determined the structure of the category of A_1-modules (which is equivalent to the category of FI-modules). In this paper, we establish analogous results for the category of A_d-modules, for any d. Modules over A_d are closely related to the structures used by the authors in previous works studying syzygies of Segre and Veronese embeddings, and we hope the results of this paper will eventually lead to improvements on those works. Our results also have implications in asymptotic commutative algebra.
Hilbert famously showed that polynomials in n variables are not too complicated, in various senses. For example, the Hilbert Syzygy Theorem shows that the process of resolving a module by free modules terminates in finitely many (in fact, at most n) steps, while the Hilbert Basis Theorem shows that the process of finding generators for an ideal also terminates in finitely many steps. These results laid the foundations for the modern algebraic study of polynomials. Hilbert's results are not uniform in n: unsurprisingly, polynomials in n variables will exhibit greater complexity as n increases. However, an array of recent work has shown that in a certain regime---namely, that where the number of polynomials and their degrees are fixed---the complexity of polynomials (in various senses) remains bounded even as the number of variables goes to infinity. We refer to this as Stillman uniformity, since Stillman's Conjecture provided the motivating example. The purpose of this paper is to give an exposition of Stillman uniformity, including: the circle of ideas initiated by Ananyan and Hochster in their proof of Stillman's Conjecture, the followup results that clarified and expanded on those ideas, and the implications for understanding polynomials in many variables.
Combining recent results on noetherianity of twisted commutative algebras by Draisma and the resolution of Stillman's conjecture by Ananyan-Hochster, we prove a broad generalization of Stillman's conjecture. Our theorem yields an array of boundedness results in commutative algebra that only depend on the degrees of the generators of an ideal, and not the number of variables in the ambient polynomial ring.
Suppose that for each n >= 0 we have a representation $M_n$ of the symmetric group S_n. Such sequences arise in a wide variety of contexts, and often exhibit uniformity in some way. We prove a number of general results along these lines in this paper: our prototypical theorem states that if $M_n$ can be given a suitable module structure over a twisted commutative algebra then the sequence $M_n$ follows a predictable pattern. We phrase these results precisely in the language of Hilbert series (or Poincaré series, or formal characters) of modules over tca's.
Given a complex curve C of genus 2, there is a well-known relationship between the moduli space of rank 3 semistable bundles on C and a cubic hypersurface known as the Coble cubic. Some of the aspects of this is known to be related to the geometric invariant theory of the third exterior power of a 9-dimensional complex vector space. We extend this relationship to arbitrary fields and study some of the connections to invariant theory, which will be studied more in-depth in a followup paper.
Previous work established a connection between the geometric invariant theory of the third exterior power of a 9-dimensional complex vector space and the moduli space of genus 2 curves with some additional data. We generalize this connection to arbitrary fields, and describe the arithmetic data needed to get a bijection between both sides of this story.
We characterize the cone of GL-equivariant Betti tables of Cohen-Macaulay modules of codimension 1, up to rational multiple, over the coordinate ring of square matrices. This result serves as the base case for `Boij-Söderberg theory for Grassmannians', with the goal of characterizing the cones of GL_k-equivariant Betti tables of modules over the coordinate ring of k x n matrices, and, dually, cohomology tables of vector bundles on the Grassmannian Gr(k, C^n). The proof uses Hall's Theorem on perfect matchings in bipartite graphs to compute the extremal rays of the cone, and constructs the corresponding equivariant free resolutions by applying Weyman's geometric technique to certain graded pure complexes of Eisenbud-Fløystad-Weyman.
For a field $k$, we prove that the $i$th homology of the groups $GL_n(k)$, $SL_n(k)$, $Sp_{2n}(k)$, $SO_{n,n}(k)$, and $SO_{n,n+1}(k)$ with coefficients in their Steinberg representations vanish for $n \geq 2i+2$.
We analyze the vanishing and non-vanishing behavior of the graded Betti numbers for Segre embeddings of products of projective spaces. We give lower bounds for when each of the rows of the Betti table becomes non-zero, and prove that our bounds are tight for Segre embeddings of products of P^1. This generalizes results of Rubei concerning the Green-Lazarsfeld property N_p for Segre embeddings. Our methods combine the Kempf-Weyman geometric technique for computing syzygies, the Ein-Erman-Lazarsfeld approach to proving non-vanishing of Betti numbers, and the theory of algebras with straightening laws.
The goal of this expository article, based on a lecture I gave at the 2016 ICRA, is to explain some recent applications of "categorical symmetries" in topology and algebraic geometry with an eye toward twisted commutative algebras as a unifying framework. The general idea is to find an action of a category on the object of interest, prove some niceness property, like finite generation, and then deduce consequences from the general properties of the category. The key in these cases is to prove that the representation theory of this category is locally noetherian, and we will discuss an outline for such proofs.
Let A be the twisted commutative algebra freely generated by d indeterminates of degree 1. We show that the regularity of an A-module can be bounded from the first floor(d^2/4) + 2 terms of its minimal free resolution. This extends results of Church and Ellenberg from the d=1 case.
We develop a functorial theory of spinor and oscillator representations parallel to the theory of Schur functors for general linear groups. This continues our work on developing orthogonal and symplectic analogues of Schur functors. As such, there are a few main points in common. We define a category of representations of what might be thought of as the infinite rank pin and metaplectic groups, and give three models of this category in terms of: multilinear algebra, diagram categories, and twisted Lie algebras. We also define specialization functors to the finite rank groups and calculate the derived functors.
We construct analogues of FI-modules where the role of the symmetric group is played by the general linear groups and the symplectic groups over finite rings and prove basic structural properties such as Noetherianity. Applications include a proof of the Lannes--Schwartz Artinian conjecture in the generic representation theory of finite fields, very general homological stability theorems with twisted coefficients for the general linear and symplectic groups over finite rings, and representation-theoretic versions of homological stability for congruence subgroups of the general linear group, the automorphism group of a free group, the symplectic group, and the mapping class group.
We use supernatural bundles to build GL-equivariant resolutions supported on the diagonal of P^n x P^n, in a way that extends Beilinson's resolution of the diagonal. We thus obtain results about supernatural bundles that largely parallel known results about exceptional collections. We apply this construction to Boij-Söderberg decompositions of cohomology tables of vector bundles, yielding a proof of concept for the idea that those positive rational decompositions should admit meaningful categorifications.
We study the ideal of maximal minors in Littlewood varieties, a class of quadratic complete intersections in spaces of matrices. We give a geometric construction for a large class of modules, including all powers of this ideal, and show that they have a linear free resolution over the complete intersection and that their Koszul dual is an infinite-dimensional irreducible representation of the orthosymplectic Lie superalgebra. We calculate the algebra of cohomology operators acting on this free resolution. We prove analogous results for powers of the ideals of maximal minors in the variety of length 2 complexes when it is a complete intersection, and show that their Koszul dual is an infinite-dimensional irreducible representation of the general linear Lie superalgebra. This generalizes work of Akin, Józefiak, Pragacz, Weyman, and the author on resolutions of determinantal ideals in polynomial rings to the setting of complete intersections and provides a new connection between representations of classical Lie superalgebras and commutative algebra. As a curious application, we prove that the cohomology of a class of reducible homogeneous bundles on symplectic and orthogonal Grassmannians and 2-step flag varieties can be calculated by an analogue of the Borel-Weil-Bott theorem.
We study representations of wreath product analogues of categories of finite sets. This includes the category of finite sets and injections (studied by Church, Ellenberg, and Farb) and the opposite of the category of finite sets and surjections (studied by the authors in previous work). We prove noetherian properties for the injective version when the group in question is polycyclic-by-finite and use it to deduce general twisted homological stability results for such wreath products and indicate some applications to representation stability. We introduce a new class of formal languages (quasi-ordered languages) and use them to deduce strong rationality properties of Hilbert series of representations for the surjective version when the group is finite.
Boij-Söderberg theory focuses on the properties and duality relationship between two types of numerical invariants. One side involves the Betti table of a graded free resolution over the polynomial ring. The other side involves the cohomology table of a coherent sheaf on projective space. We discuss open questions and problems in Boij-Söderberg theory.