Tridiagonal pairs of \(q\)-Racah type and the \(\mu \)-conjecture (Q968992)

Let \(V\) be a finite dimensional vector space over an arbitrary field \(\mathbb{K}\) and consider a pair \(A,A^{\ast}\) of linear operators on \(V\) (confusingly, the notation \(A^{\ast}\) does not refer to the hermitian conjugate). The pair \((A,A^{\ast})\) is called tridiagonal if: (i) both \(A\) and \(A^{\ast}\) are diagonalizable over \(\mathbb{K}\); (ii) the eigenspaces of \(A\) can be ordered \(V_{0},\dots,V_{d}\) such that \(A^{\ast}V_{i}\subseteq V_{i-1}+V_{i}+V_{i+1}\) for each \(i\) (with \(V_{-1}=V_{d+1}=0\)); (iii) the analogous property holds for the action of \(A\) on the eigenspaces of \(A^{\ast }\); and (iv) there is no proper nontrivial subspace of \(V\) invariant under both \(A\) and \(A^{\ast}\). It is known that \(A^{\ast}\) and \(A\) must have the same number of eigenspaces and that the \(i\)th eigenspaces for the two operators with the given orderings have the same dimension, say \(\rho_{i}\); furthermore, \(\rho_{d-i}=\rho_{i}\) for each \(i\), and we have \(\rho_{0}=1\) if \(\mathbb{K}\) is algebraically closed [see \textit{T. Ito, K. Tanabe} and \textit{P. Terwilliger}, Discrete Math. Theor. Comput. Sci. 56, 167--192 (2001; Zbl 0995.05148)]. \textit{T. Ito} and \textit{P. Terwilliger} [Linear Algebra Appl. 427, No.~2--3, 218--233 (2007; Zbl 1132.15010)] have conjectured that there exists an (essentially unique) tridiagonal pair for which \(A\) and \(A^*\) have specified eigenvalues provided these lists of eigenvalues satisfy certain necessary conditions. In the present paper the authors show that a slightly stronger result (the ``\(\mu\)-conjecture'') holds under an extra assumption (being of ``\(q\)-Racah type''). The details are too technical to describe here.