On the support of the free Lie algebra: the Sch\"utzenberger problems

TL;DR

This paper investigates the support of free Lie algebras over modular integers, introduces new algebraic tools, and provides conditions for words to belong to these algebras, extending classical results with novel polynomial constructs.

Contribution

It introduces the Pascal descent polynomial and rephrases support problems using the symmetric group action, offering a more natural approach and new conjectures for twin and anti-twin words.

Findings

Reformulation of support problems via group ring actions.

Introduction of Pascal descent polynomial with binomial coefficient properties.

Sufficient conditions for words to be in the free Lie algebra over m.

Abstract

M.-P. Sch\"utzenberger asked to determine the support of the free Lie algebra ${\mathcal L}_{{\mathbb Z}_{m}}(A)$ on a finite alphabet $A$ over the ring ${\mathbb Z}_{m}$ of integers $\bmod m$ and all the corresponding pairs of twin and anti-twin words, i.e., words that appear with equal (resp. opposite) coefficients in each Lie polynomial. We study these problems using the adjoint endomorphism $l^{*}$ of the left normed Lie bracketing $l$ of ${\mathcal L}_{{\mathbb Z}_{m}}(A)$. Calculating $l^{*}(w)$ via all factors of a given word $w$ of fixed length and the shuffle product, we recover the result of Duchamp and Thibon $(1989)$ for the support of the free Lie ring in a much more natural way. We rephrase these problems, for words of length $n$, in terms of the action of the left normed multi-linear Lie bracketing $l_{n}$ of ${\mathcal L}_{{\mathbb Z}_{m}}(A)$ - viewed as an element of the group ring of the symmetric group ${\mathcal S}_{n}$ - on $\lambda$-tabloids, where $\lambda$ is a partition of $n$. For words $w$ in two letters, represented by a subset $I$ of $[n] = \{1, 2, ..., n \}$, this leads us to the {\em Pascal descent polynomial} $p_{n}(I)$, a particular commutative multi-linear polynomial which equals to a signed binomial coefficient when $|I| = 1$ and allows us to obtain a sufficient condition on $n$ and $I$ in order that $w$ lies in ${\mathcal L}_{{\mathbb Z}_{m}}(A)$. We also have a particular conjecture for twin and anti-twin words for the free Lie ring and show that it is enough to be checked for $|A| = 2$.