Odd-versus-distinct partition hook bias conjecture

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Let O(n)\mathcal O(n) be the set of partitions of nn into odd parts and let D(n)\mathcal D(n) be the set of partitions of nn into distinct parts. For t≥1t\geq 1, let at(n)a_t(n) and bt(n)b_t(n) denote the total numbers of hooks of length tt in the partitions in O(n)\mathcal O(n) and D(n)\mathcal D(n), respectively.

Odd-versus-distinct hook bias conjecture. For every integer t≥2t\geq 2, there exists an integer NtN_t such that for all n>Ntn>N_t, at(n)≥bt(n)a_t(n)\geq b_t(n). The conjectured values are

(N2,N3,N4,N5,N6,N7,N8,N9,N10)=(0,7,8,18,16,34,34,56,59).(N_2,N_3,N_4,N_5,N_6,N_7,N_8,N_9,N_{10})=(0,7,8,18,16,34,34,56,59).

Moreover, for every integer t≥2t\geq 2,

at(n)−bt(n)→∞as n→∞.a_t(n)-b_t(n)\to\infty\quad\text{as }n\to\infty.

This reverses the bias at hook length 11, where the corresponding inequality goes in the opposite direction. The assertion is proved for t=2t=2 and t=3t=3 in the cited paper, while the general case remains conjectural.

References

Primary source

Cristina Ballantine, Hannah Burson, William Craig, Amanda Folsom and Boya Wen, “Hook length biases and general linear partition inequalities”, arXiv:2303.16512 (2023).

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