Chamber behavior of double Hurwitz numbers in genus 0 (Q2461783)

The topic of the paper under review is the study of genus \(0\) double Hurwitz numbers. For two partitions \(\lambda,\mu\) of the same integer \(d\), the double Hurwitz number \(h_{0;\lambda,\mu}\) is the number of non-isomorphic degree \(d\) coverings of the sphere by a sphere, with branching corresponding to \(\lambda\) (resp., \(\mu\)) over \(0\) (resp., \(\infty)\) and an appropriate number of fixed simple branch points. Double Hurwitz numbers for every genus \(g\) were studied by \textit{I.~P.~Goulden, D.~M.~Jackson} and \textit{R.~Vakil} [Adv. Math. 198, No. 1, 43--92 (2005; Zbl 1086.14022)]. There it was proved that if the length \(m\) of \(\lambda\) and \(n\) of \(\mu\) is fixed, double Hurwitz numbers are piecewise polynomials in the variables \(\lambda_1,\dots,\lambda_m,\mu_1,\dots,\mu_n\). Moreover, for genus \(0\) this piecewise polynomial is homogeneous of degree \(m+n-3\). In the article under review, it is explained how these polynomials can be computed for fixed \(m,n\). The authors consider the parameter space for \(h_{0;m,n}\), i.e. the subset of \(\mathbb R^{m+n}\) on which \(h_{0;m,n}\) is defined, and divide it into the polynomiality domains, called chambers. An explicit description of the hyperplanes separating the chambers is given, as well as a formula describing how \(h_{0;m,n}\) varies between neighbouring chambers. Together with an expression for a special chamber called totally negative, these formulas enable to compute all Hurwitz numbers \(h_{0;m,n}\) by recurrence.