Circular law for sparse random regular digraphs (Q2659439)

Summary: Fix a constant \(C \geq 1\) and let \(d = d(n)\) satisfy \(d \leq \ln^C n\) for every large integer \(n\). Denote by \(A_n\) the adjacency matrix of a uniform random directed \(d\)-regular graph on \(n\) vertices. We show that if \(d \to \infty\) as \(n \to \infty\), the empirical spectral distribution of the appropriately rescaled matrix \(A_n\) converges weakly in probability to the circular law. This result, together with an earlier work of \textit{N. Cook} [Ann. Inst. Henri Poincaré, Probab. Stat. 55, No. 4, 2111--2167 (2019; Zbl 1432.15035)], completely settles the problem of weak convergence of the empirical distribution in a directed \(d\)-regular setting with the degree tending to infinity. As a crucial element of our proof, we develop a technique of bounding intermediate singular values of \(A_n\) based on studying random normals to rowspaces and on constructing a product structure to deal with the lack of independence between matrix entries.