On the tropical Lefschetz-Hopf trace formula (Q6098210)

This paper is a major advancement in tropical intersection theory, proving a local combinatorial version of the Lefschetz-Hopf formula. In classical topology, a formula of this type computes the number of fixed points (counted with multiplicities) of a continuous map from a compact topological space to itself in terms of an alternating sum of traces of the induced homomorphisms on the homology groups, provided that the number of fixed points is finite. However, even if this condition doesn't hold the formula still makes sense if ``the number of fixed points'' is replaced with an intersection product of the graph of the continuous function with the diagonal inside the cartesian square of the topological space. A particular instance of such a situation is when the map is the identity map, in this case, the formula tells that the self-intersection of the diagonal is equal to the Euler characteristic. A version of the latter formula (under the name ``Poincaré-Hopf'') for matroids was proven by Rau in the previous article and the paper under review is its follow-up. A matroid here should be thought of as a combinatorial structure encoding a local model of a smooth tropical manifold via the construction associating a rational balanced fan to the matroid. A limitation of the current setup is that Rau deduces the formula only for an automorphism of this fan induced by an automorphism of the matroid, therefore the main result is seen as an intermediate step in proving a general version of the formula, which was already shown to hold at least in the cases of tropical curves and Abelian varieties. The key ingredient of the proof of the current version of the formula is the generalized \(\beta\)-invariant of the lattice of flats of the matroid which are fixed under the automorphism. By two independent lines of argument, this invariant is shown to be equal to both sides of the Lefschetz-Hopf formula. The intersection theoretic side of the formula is shown to coincide, up to a sign, with the \(\beta\)-invariant via quite tedious combinatorial reasoning relying on a rather explicit description of the diagonal as a chain of intersection products inside the cartesian square. The equality of the trace side of the formula to the \(\beta\)-invariant, however, is a transparent algebra and is dealt with via the resolution of the tropical homology of the fan. Overall, the paper is recommended to anyone working with matroids or interested in tropical geometry, but since it is not entirely self-contained, going through the references therein might be necessary to understand the details.