A theory of counting nonintersecting lattice paths by the major index and its generalizations is developed. We obtain determinantal expressions for the corresponding generating functions for families of nonintersecting lattice paths with given starting points and given final points, where the starting points lie on a line parallel to [italic]x + [italic]y = 0. In some cases these determinants can be evaluated to result in simple products. As applications we compute the generating function for tableaux with [italic]p odd rows, with at most [italic]c columns, and with parts between 1 and [italic]n. Moreover, we compute the generating function for the same kind of tableaux which in addition have only odd parts. We thus also obtain a closed form for the generating function for symmetric plane partitions with at most [italic]n rows, with parts between 1 and [italic]c, and with [italic]p odd entries on the main diagonal. In each case the result is a simple product. By summing with respect to [italic]p we provide new proofs of the Bender-Knuth and MacMahon (ex-)conjectures, which were first proved by Andrews, Gordon, and Macdonald. The link between nonintersecting lattice paths and tableaux is given by variations of the Knuth correspondence.

Sri Gopal Mohanty has made pioneering contributions to lattice path counting and its applications to probability and statistics. This is clearly evident from his lifetime publications list and the numerous citations his publications have received over the past three decades. My association with him began in 1982 when I came to McMaster Univer sity. Since then, I have been associated with him on many different issues at professional as well as cultural levels; I have benefited greatly from him on both these grounds. I have enjoyed very much being his colleague in the statistics group here at McMaster University and also as his friend. While I admire him for his honesty, sincerity and dedication, I appreciate very much his kindness, modesty and broad-mindedness. Aside from our common interest in mathematics and statistics, we both have great love for Indian classical music and dance. We have spent numerous many different subjects associated with the Indian music and hours discussing dance. I still remember fondly the long drive (to Amherst, Massachusetts) I had a few years ago with him and his wife, Shantimayee, and all the hearty discussions we had during that journey. Combinatorics and applications of combinatorial methods in probability and statistics has become a very active and fertile area of research in the recent past.

This book endeavors to deepen our understanding of lattice path combinatorics, explore key types of special sequences, elucidate their interconnections, and concurrently champion the author's interpretation of the “combinatorial spirit”. The author intends to give an up-to-date introduction to the theory of lattice path combinatorics, its relation to those special counting sequences important in modern combinatorial studies, such as the Catalan, Schröder, Motzkin, Delannoy numbers, and their generalized versions. Brief discussions of applications of lattice path combinatorics to symmetric functions and connections to the theory of tableaux are also included. Meanwhile, the author also presents an interpretation of the "combinatorial spirit" (i.e., "counting without counting", bijective proofs, and understanding combinatorics from combinatorial structures internally, and more), hoping to shape the development of contemporary combinatorics. Lattice Path Combinatorics and Special Counting Sequences: From an Enumerative Perspective will appeal to graduate students and advanced undergraduates studying combinatorics, discrete mathematics, or computer science.

Presenting the state of the art, the Handbook of Enumerative Combinatorics brings together the work of today's most prominent researchers. The contributors survey the methods of combinatorial enumeration along with the most frequent applications of these methods.This important new work is edited by Miklos Bona of the University of Florida where he

This memoir is a careful and detailed study of the intersection pairing in the Conley index. The Conley index associates to an isolated invariant set of a semiflow (with some mild compactness conditions) a homotopy type of a space, constructed to be invariant under perturbations of the flow. The homology of this space is the homology Conley index. For a (two-sided) flow, each isolated invariant set has two indices defined: one for the forward flow, and one for the reverse. In general, there is no relationship between these two indices, but when the flow is on an orientable manifold, the two indices can be related by an intersection pairing. It is this pairing that receives a careful and detailed study in this memoir. Results are then applied to the motivating example of the work: the existence of transition layer behavior for two-point boundary value problems of singularly perturbed systems.