Rational smoothness and affine Schubert varieties of type A

Abstract

The study of Schubert varieties in G/B has led to numerous advances in algebraic combinatorics and algebraic geometry. These varieties are indexed by elements of the corresponding Weyl group, an affine Weyl group, or one of their parabolic quotients. Often times, the goal is to determine which of the algebraic and topological properties of the Schubert variety can be described in terms of the combinatorics of its corresponding Weyl group element. A celebrated example of this occurs when G/B is of type A, due to Lakshmibai and Sandhya. They showed that the smooth Schubert varieties are precisely those indexed by permutations that avoid the patterns 3412 and 4231. Our main result is a characterization of the rationally smooth Schubert varieties corresponding to affine permutations in terms of the patterns 4231 and 3412 and the twisted spiral permutations.

Keywords

• pattern avoidance
• affine permutations
• schubert varieties
• [math.math-co] mathematics [math]/combinatorics [math.co]
• [info.info-dm] computer science [cs]/discrete mathematics [cs.dm]