Gale duality bounds for roots of polynomials with nonnegative coefficients (Q965210)

Numerous counting functions turn out to be polynomials, and many polynomials appearing in combinatorics have nonnegative coefficients when written in terms of a specific basis of the vector space of polynomials of degree at most \(d\). Two examples are chromatic polynomials (which count proper colorings of a graph) and Ehrhart polynomials (which count integer points in dilates of lattice polytopes); in both cases, the polynomial coefficients are nonnegative when expressed in terms of the binomial coefficient basis \(\left( z \atop d \right)\), \(\left( {z+1} \atop d \right)\), \dots, \(\left( {z+d} \atop d \right)\). The paper under review provides a systematic study of bounds for the roots of any polynomial that have nonnegative coefficients with respect to a fixed but arbitrary basis. Motivated by [\textit{B. Braun}, ``Norm bounds for Ehrhart polynomial roots'', Discrete Comput. Geom. 39, No. 1--3, 191--193 (2008; Zbl 1141.52017)] and [\textit{B. Braun} and \textit{M. Develin}, ``Ehrhart polynomial roots and Stanley's non-negativity theorem'', Contemporary Mathematics 452, 67--78 (2008; Zbl 1161.52310)], the author interprets the basis polynomials as vector fields in the plane and at each point analyzes the combinatorics of the Gale dual vector configuration. The paper gives some quite general (and undoubtedly useful) theorems on roots of polynomials, applies them to the roots of chromatic and Ehrhart polynomials, and concludes with intriguing pictures of root clusters of random polynomials.