Generalized Small Schröder Numbers

Abstract

We study generalized small Schröder paths in the sense of arbitrary sizes of steps. A generalized small Schröder path is a generalized lattice path from $(0,0)$ to $(2n,0)$ with the step set of $\{(k,k), (l,-l), (2r,0)\, |\, k,l,r \in {\bf P}\}$, where ${\bf P}$ is the set of positive integers, which never goes below the $x$-axis, and with no horizontal steps at level 0. We find a bijection between 5-colored Dyck paths and generalized small Schröder paths, proving that the number of generalized small Schröder paths is equal to $\sum_{k=1}^{n} N(n,k)5^{n-k}$ for $n\geq 1$.