The relation between alternating sign matrices and descending plane partitions: n + 3 pairs of equivalent statistics

Abstract

There is the same number of n×n alternating sign matrices (ASMs) as there is of descending plane partitions (DPPs) with parts no greater than n, but finding an explicit bijection is an open problem for about 40 years now. So far, quadruples of statistics on ASMs and on DPPs that have the same joint distribution have been identified. We introduce extensions of ASMs and of DPPs along with n+3 statistics on each extension, and show that the two families of statistics have the same joint distribution. The ASM-DPP equinumerosity is obtained as an easy consequence by considering the (−1)-enumerations of these extended objects with respect to one pair of the n+3 pairs of statistics. One may speculate that the fact that these extensions might be necessary to have this significant increase in the number of statistics, as well as the involvement of signs when specializing to ASMs and DPPs may hint at the obstacles in finding an explicit bijection between ASMs and DPPs. One important tool for our proof is a multivariate generalization of the operator formula for the number of monotone triangles with prescribed bottom row that generalizes Schur functions.