Enumeration of three-quadrant walks via invariants: some diagonally symmetric models

TL;DR

This paper classifies and solves certain three-quadrant lattice walk models with diagonal symmetry using invariants, revealing algebraic, D-finite, and D-algebraic generating functions, and provides explicit formulas and harmonic functions.

Contribution

It introduces a uniform invariant-based approach to solve and classify three-quadrant walk models, identifying their algebraic and D-finite nature, and extends methods from quadrant models to non-convex cones.

Findings

Five models are solved using invariants, with three algebraic, one D-finite, and one D-algebraic.

The solutions relate the generating functions of three-quadrant walks to those of quadrant models.

Explicit algebraic descriptions of positive harmonic functions are derived for the models.

Abstract

In the past 20 years, the enumeration of plane lattice walks confined to a convex cone -- normalized into the first quadrant -- has received a lot of attention, stimulated the development of several original approaches, and led to a rich collection of results. Most of them deal with the nature of the associated generating function: for which models is it algebraic, D-finite, D-algebraic? By model, what we mean is a finite collection of allowed steps. More recently, similar questions have been raised for non-convex cones, typically the three-quadrant cone $C = \{ (i,j) : i \geq 0 \text{ or } j \geq 0 \}$. They turn out to be more difficult than their quadrant counterparts. In this paper, we investigate a collection of eight models in $C$. This collection consists of diagonally symmetric models in $\{-1, 0,1\}^2\setminus\{(-1,1), (1,-1)\}$. Three of them are known not to be D-algebraic. We show that the remaining five can be solved in a uniform fashion using Tutte's notion of \emph{invariants}, which has already proved useful for some quadrant models. Three models are found to be algebraic, one is (only) D-finite, and the last one is (only) D-algebraic. We also solve in the same fashion the diagonal model $\{ \nearrow, \nwarrow, \swarrow, \searrow\}$, which is D-finite. The three algebraic models are those of the Kreweras trilogy, $S=\{\nearrow, \leftarrow, \downarrow\}$, $S'=\{\rightarrow, \uparrow, \swarrow\}$, and $S\cup S'$. Our solutions take similar forms for all six models. Roughly speaking, the square of the generating function of three-quadrant walks with steps in $S$ is an explicit rational function in the quadrant generating function with steps in $\{(j-i,j): (i,j) \in S\}$. We derive various corollaries, including an explicit algebraic description of the positive harmonic function in $C$ for the five models that are at least D-finite.