A One-Stop Source of Known Results, a Bibliography of Papers on the Subject, and Novel Research Directions Focusing on a very active area of research in the last decade, Combinatorics of Compositions and Words provides an introduction to the methods used in the combinatorics of pattern avoidance and pattern enumeration in compositions and words. It
Analytic combinatorics aims to enable precise quantitative predictions of the properties of large combinatorial structures. The theory has emerged over recent decades as essential both for the analysis of algorithms and for the study of scientific models in many disciplines, including probability theory, statistical physics, computational biology, and information theory. With a careful combination of symbolic enumeration methods and complex analysis, drawing heavily on generating functions, results of sweeping generality emerge that can be applied in particular to fundamental structures such as permutations, sequences, strings, walks, paths, trees, graphs and maps. This account is the definitive treatment of the topic. The authors give full coverage of the underlying mathematics and a thorough treatment of both classical and modern applications of the theory. The text is complemented with exercises, examples, appendices and notes to aid understanding. The book can be used for an advanced undergraduate or a graduate course, or for self-study.
Bijective proofs are some of the most elegant and powerful techniques in all of mathematics. Suitable for readers without prior background in algebra or combinatorics, Bijective Combinatorics presents a general introduction to enumerative and algebraic combinatorics that emphasizes bijective methods.The text systematically develops the mathematical
A First Course in Enumerative Combinatorics provides an introduction to the fundamentals of enumeration for advanced undergraduates and beginning graduate students in the mathematical sciences. The book offers a careful and comprehensive account of the standard tools of enumeration—recursion, generating functions, sieve and inversion formulas, enumeration under group actions—and their application to counting problems for the fundamental structures of discrete mathematics, including sets and multisets, words and permutations, partitions of sets and integers, and graphs and trees. The author's exposition has been strongly influenced by the work of Rota and Stanley, highlighting bijective proofs, partially ordered sets, and an emphasis on organizing the subject under various unifying themes, including the theory of incidence algebras. In addition, there are distinctive chapters on the combinatorics of finite vector spaces, a detailed account of formal power series, and combinatorial number theory. The reader is assumed to have a knowledge of basic linear algebra and some familiarity with power series. There are over 200 well-designed exercises ranging in difficulty from straightforward to challenging. There are also sixteen large-scale honors projects on special topics appearing throughout the text. The author is a distinguished combinatorialist and award-winning teacher, and he is currently Professor Emeritus of Mathematics and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Tennessee. He has published widely in number theory, combinatorics, probability, decision theory, and formal epistemology. His Erdős number is 2.
There has been considerable interest recently in the subject of patterns in permutations and words, a new branch of combinatorics with its roots in the works of Rotem, Rogers, and Knuth in the 1970s. Consideration of the patterns in question has been extremely interesting from the combinatorial point of view, and it has proved to be a useful language in a variety of seemingly unrelated problems, including the theory of Kazhdan—Lusztig polynomials, singularities of Schubert varieties, interval orders, Chebyshev polynomials, models in statistical mechanics, and various sorting algorithms, including sorting stacks and sortable permutations. The author collects the main results in the field in this up-to-date, comprehensive reference volume. He highlights significant achievements in the area, and points to research directions and open problems. The book will be of interest to researchers and graduate students in theoretical computer science and mathematics, in particular those working in algebraic combinatorics and combinatorics on words. It will also be of interest to specialists in other branches of mathematics, theoretical physics, and computational biology. The author collects the main results in the field in this up-to-date, comprehensive reference volume. He highlights significant achievements in the area, and points to research directions and open problems. The book will be of interest to researchers and graduate students in theoretical computer science and mathematics, in particular those working in algebraic combinatorics and combinatorics on words. It will also be of interest to specialists in other branches of mathematics, theoretical physics, and computational biology.
This book is a gentle introduction to the enumerative part of combinatorics suitable for study at the advanced undergraduate or beginning graduate level. In addition to covering all the standard techniques for counting combinatorial objects, the text contains material from the research literature which has never before appeared in print, such as the use of quotient posets to study the Möbius function and characteristic polynomial of a partially ordered set, or the connection between quasisymmetric functions and pattern avoidance. The book assumes minimal background, and a first course in abstract algebra should suffice. The exposition is very reader friendly: keeping a moderate pace, using lots of examples, emphasizing recurring themes, and frankly expressing the delight the author takes in mathematics in general and combinatorics in particular.
Focusing on a very active area of mathematical research in the last decade, Combinatorics of Set Partitions presents methods used in the combinatorics of pattern avoidance and pattern enumeration in set partitions. Designed for students and researchers in discrete mathematics, the book is a one-stop reference on the results and research activities of set partitions from 1500 A.D. to today. Each chapter gives historical perspectives and contrasts different approaches, including generating functions, kernel method, block decomposition method, generating tree, and Wilf equivalences. Methods and definitions are illustrated with worked examples and MapleTM code. End-of-chapter problems often draw on data from published papers and the author’s extensive research in this field. The text also explores research directions that extend the results discussed. C++ programs and output tables are listed in the appendices and available for download on the author’s web page.
Detecting Signals at the Single Molecule Level: Pioneering Achievements in MicroscopyRecent advances have led to such remarkable improvements in fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy's (FLIM) capacity for contrast and sensitivity that researchers can now employ it to detect signals at the single molecule level. FLIM also offers the additional be
Combinatorial reciprocity is a very interesting phenomenon, which can be described as follows: A polynomial, whose values at positive integers count combinatorial objects of some sort, may give the number of combinatorial objects of a different sort when evaluated at negative integers (and suitably normalized). Such combinatorial reciprocity theorems occur in connections with graphs, partially ordered sets, polyhedra, and more. Using the combinatorial reciprocity theorems as a leitmotif, this book unfolds central ideas and techniques in enumerative and geometric combinatorics. Written in a friendly writing style, this is an accessible graduate textbook with almost 300 exercises, numerous illustrations, and pointers to the research literature. Topics include concise introductions to partially ordered sets, polyhedral geometry, and rational generating functions, followed by highly original chapters on subdivisions, geometric realizations of partially ordered sets, and hyperplane arrangements.
