Complementary algorithms for tableaux (Q5952336)

In 1987, in his theory of rational tableaux, Stembridge found a striking duality between the insertion procedure of Schensted and the theory of jeu de taquin of Schützenberger. In the paper under review the authors introduce the involutive tableau operation of complementation to formalize this duality and show that the internal row insertion and the jeu de taquin give complementary operations on pairs of tableaux. By conjugation, one may consider the operation of internal column insertion. The complementary operation hopscotch, studied by the authors, is new, although it extends known algorithms. Like the other three operations, this new operation may be computed with a set of local rules in a grow diagram. The four operations of jeu de taquin, internal row insertion, internal column insertion and hopscotch preserve the Knuth equivalence. Hence hopscotch gives rise to new algorithms to rectify tableaux. The authors also establish that these four operations have the same dual-equivalence theory.