# Untitled Document

PROOF OF A CONJECTURE OF CHAN, ROBBINS, AND YUEN 

Doron ZEILBERGER <sup>1</sup> Department of Mathematics, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA 19122, USA. zeilberg@math.temple.edu http://www.math.temple.edu/~zeilberg/ . Nov. 17, 1998. Supported in part by the NSF. 

Abstract: Using the celebrated Morris Constant Term Identity, we deduce a recent conjecture of Chan, Robbins, and Yuen (math.CO/9810154), that asserts that the volume of a certain $`n(n1)/2`$-dimensional polytope is given in terms of the product of the first $`n1`$ Catalan numbers.

Chan, Robbins, and Yuen\[CRY\] conjectured that the cardinality of a certain set of triangular arrays $`𝒜_n`$ defined in pp. 6-7 of \[CRY\] equals the product of the first $`n1`$ Catalan numbers. It is easy to see that their conjecture is equivalent to the following constant term identity (for any rational function $`f(z)`$ of a variable $`z`$, $`CT_zf(z)`$ is the coeff. of $`z^0`$ in the formal Laurent expansion of $`f(z)`$ (that always exists)):

$$CT_{x_n}\mathrm{}CT_{x_1}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}(1x_i)^2\underset{1i<jn}{}(x_jx_i)^1=\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}\frac{1}{i+1}\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{2i}{i}\right).$$
$`(CRY)`$   
But this is just the special case $`a=2`$, $`b=0`$, $`c=1/2`$, of the Morris Identity\[M\] (where we made some trivial changes of discrete variables, and ‘shadowed’ it)

$$CT_{x_n}\mathrm{}CT_{x_1}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}(1x_i)^a\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}x_i^b\underset{1i<jn}{}(x_jx_i)^{2c}=\frac{1}{n!}\underset{j=0}{\overset{n1}{}}\frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }(a+b+(n1+j)c)\mathrm{\Gamma }(c)}{\mathrm{\Gamma }(a+jc)\mathrm{\Gamma }(c+jc)\mathrm{\Gamma }(b+jc+1)}.$$
$`(Chip)`$   
To show that the right side of $`(Chip)`$ reduces to the right side of $`(CRY)`$ upon the specialization $`a=2,b=0,c=1/2`$, do the plugging in the former and call it $`M_n`$. Then manipulate the products to simplify $`M_n/M_{n1}`$, and then use Legendre’s duplication formula $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(z)\mathrm{\Gamma }(z+1/2)=\mathrm{\Gamma }(2z)\mathrm{\Gamma }(1/2)/2^{2z1}`$ three times, and voilà, up pops the Catalan number $`\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{2n}{n}\right)/(n+1)`$.        

Remarks: 1. By converting the left side of $`(Chip)`$ into a contour integral, we get the same integrand as in the Selberg integral (with $`aa,bb1,cc`$). Aomoto’s proof of the Selberg integral (SIAM J. Math. Anal. 18(1987), 545-549) goes verbatim. 2. Conjecture 2 in \[CRY\] follows in the same way, from (the obvious contour-integral analog of) Aomoto’s extension of Selberg’s integral. Introduce a new variable $`t`$, stick $`CT_tt^k`$ in front of $`(CRY)`$, and replace $`(1x_i)^2`$ by $`(1x_i)^1(t+x_i/(1x_i))`$. 3. Conjecture 3 follows in the same way from another specialization of $`(Chip)`$.

References \[CRY\] Clara S. Chan, David P. Robbins, and David S. Yuen, On the volume of a certain polytope, math.CO/9810154. \[M\] Walter Morris, “Constant term identities for finite and affine root systems, conjectures and theorems”, Ph.D. thesis, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, 1982.