The number of rhombus tilings of a ``punctured'' hexagon and the minor summation formula (Q1271867)

The paper is concerned with the enumeration of rhombus tilings of a certain hexagon, where some triangle near the hexagon's center is missing (hence the term ``punctured'' hexagon in the title). This kind of enumeration problem was proposed by Propp and has recently received considerable interest, since it often leads to beautiful formulas. Here, the enumeration gives a simple closed formula involving MacMahon's expression for the number of plane partitions in some box. The proof, however, is quite intricate and involves nonintersecting lattice paths and a Schur function identity, which is proved by means of Ishikawa's and Wakayama's minor summation formula for Pfaffians.