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# x Analysis of the [𝟓𝟔,2⁺] Baryon Masses in the 𝟏/𝑁_𝑐 Expansion

## Abstract

The mass spectrum of the positive parity $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔},2^+]`$ baryons is studied in the $`1/N_c`$ expansion up to and including $`𝒪(1/N_c)`$ effects with $`SU(3)`$ symmetry breaking implemented to first order. A total of eighteen mass relations result, several of which are tested with the available data. The breaking of spin-flavor symmetry is dominated by the hyperfine interactions, while spin-orbit effects are found to be small.

preprint:   JLAB-THY-03-25 DUKE-TH-03-238 ECT-03-08

In the mass range from 1600 to 2100 MeV there exists a set of positive parity baryons which might be assigned to an irreducible representation $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔},2^+]`$ of $`SU(6)O(3)`$, where $`SU(6)`$ is the spin-flavor group and $`O(3)`$ classifies the orbital excitations. Among the candidate states in that set, all non-strange states are known as well as seven strangeness $`𝒮=1`$ states. Some of the strange states are, however, established with low certainty (two stars or less in the Particle Data Listings PDG02 ). In this letter the available empirical information is used to implement an analysis of the masses based on the $`1/N_c`$ expansion of QCD tHo74 ; Wit79 , an approach that has turned out to be very successful in baryon phenomenology.

The $`1/N_c`$ expansion has been applied to the ground state baryons DM93 ; DJM94 ; DJM95 ; CGO94 ; Jenk1 ; JL95 ; DDJM96 , and to excited baryons, where the masses and decays of the negative parity spin-flavor $`\mathrm{𝟕𝟎}`$-plet Goi97 ; PY ; CCGL ; CaCa98 ; SGS  and the positive parity Roper $`\mathrm{𝟓𝟔}`$-plet CC00  have been analyzed. Two frameworks have been used in implementing the $`1/N_c`$ expansion for baryons. One framework is based on the contracted spin-flavor $`SU(2N_f)_c`$ symmetry, $`N_f`$ being the number of light flavors, which is a symmetry of QCD in the $`N_c\mathrm{}`$ limit DM93 ; GS84 ; PY . In this framework commutation relations of operators like axial currents and hadron masses are constrained by consistency relations. The observed baryons at $`N_c=3`$ are identified with the low lying spin states of an infinite representation of the contracted symmetry. The second framework makes use of the spin-flavor $`SU(2N_f)`$ algebra, with an explicit representation of operators that act on a space of states constructed as tensor products of $`N_c`$ valence quarks CGO94 . Both approaches are consistent and deliver equivalent results order by order in the $`1/N_c`$ expansion. From the practical point of view, however, the second one is easier to work with, especially at subleading orders in $`1/N_c`$, and for this reason it has been chosen in most analyses. Another advantage in this approach, is the possibility of using the language of the constituent quark model, as applied to the spin-flavor degrees of freedom, without any loss of generality.

The study of excited baryons is not free of difficulties. Although a significant amount of symmetry in the form of a contracted $`SU(2N_f)_c`$ is always present in the $`N_c\mathrm{}`$ limit PY ; PS03 , there is no strict spin-flavor symmetry in that limit. Indeed, as it was shown in Goi97 , spin-orbit interactions break spin-flavor symmetry at $`𝒪(N_c^0)`$ in states belonging to mixed symmetric spin-flavor representations, and configuration mixing, i.e., mixing of states belonging to different spin-flavor multiplets in general occurs at $`𝒪(N_c^0)`$ as well. The use of spin-flavor symmetry as a zeroth order approximation is therefore not warranted for excited baryons. However, a phenomenological fact is that spin-orbit interactions are very small (in the real world with $`N_c=3`$ they have a magnitude expected for $`𝒪(N_c^2)`$ effects), and since all sources of $`𝒪(N_c^0)`$ spin-flavor breaking, including the configuration mixing, requires such orbital interactions, it is justified to treat them in practice as subleading. Thanks to this observation, the usage of spin-flavor $`SU(2N_f)`$ as the zeroth order symmetry is justified. A second problem is posed by the fact that excited baryons have finite widths. The impact of this on the analyses of the masses is not fully clarified yet. One likely possibility is that their effects are included in the effective parameters that determine the masses’ $`1/N_c`$ expansion. This is an issue that has been recently considered in Ref. CL03 .

The analysis of the $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔},2^+]`$ masses is made along the lines established in previous investigations of the $`[\mathrm{𝟕𝟎},1^{}]`$ baryons Goi97 ; CCGL ; SGS . The $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔},2^+]`$ multiplet contains two $`SU(3)`$ octets with total angular momentum $`J=3/2`$ and $`5/2`$, and four decuplets with $`J=1/2`$, $`3/2`$, $`5/2`$ and $`7/2`$, as listed in Table 5. Note that the octets have spin $`S=1/2`$ while the decuplets have spin $`S=3/2`$ as in the ground state baryons. For non-strange states this is the $`I=S`$ rule. The states are obtained by coupling the orbital part with $`\mathrm{}=2`$ to the spin-flavor symmetric states, namely,

$`|JJ_z;S;(p=2S,q),Y,II_z_{_{\mathrm{Sym}}}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{m,S_z}{}}\left(\begin{array}{ccc}S& \mathrm{}& J\\ S_z& m& J_z\end{array}\right)|SS_z;(p,q),Y,II_z_{_{\mathrm{Sym}}}\mathrm{}=2m`$ (3)
where $`(p,q)`$ label the $`SU(3)`$ representation and $`Y`$ stands for the hypercharge. Note that, unlike the states in mixed-symmetric representations where excited and core quarks have to be distinguished for the purpose of building a basis of mass operators, such a distinction is unnecessary for the symmetric representation.

The mass operator can be expressed as a string of terms expanded in $`1/N_c`$:

$$H_{\mathrm{mass}}=c_iO_i+b_i\overline{B}_i$$
(4)
where the operators $`O_i`$ are $`SU(3)`$ singlets and the operators $`\overline{B}_i`$ provide $`SU(3)`$ breaking and are defined to have vanishing matrix elements between non-strange states. The effective coefficients $`c_i`$ and $`b_i`$ are reduced matrix elements that encode the QCD dynamics and they are determined by a fit to the empirically known masses.

The operators $`O_i`$ and $`\overline{B}_i`$ can be expressed as positive parity and rotationally invariant products of generators of $`SU(6)O(3)`$ as it has been explained elsewhere Goi97 . A generic $`n`$-body operator has the structure

$`O^{(n)}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N_c^{n1}}}O_{\mathrm{}}O_{SF},`$ (5)
where the factors $`O_{\mathrm{}}`$ and $`O_{SF}`$ can be expressed in terms of products of generators of the orbital group $`O(3)`$ $`(\mathrm{}_i)`$, and of the spin-flavor group $`SU(6)`$ ($`S_i,T_a`$ and $`G_{ia}`$), respectively. The explicit $`1/N_c`$ factors originate in the $`n1`$ gluon exchanges required to give rise to an $`n`$-body operator. The matrix elements of operators may also carry a nontrivial $`N_c`$ dependence due to coherence effectsDM93 : for the states considered, $`G_{ia}`$ ($`a=1,2,3`$) and $`T_8`$ have matrix elements of $`𝒪(N_c)`$, while the rest of the generators have matrix elements of zeroth order.

At each order in $`1/N_c`$ and $`ϵ`$, where the latter parameter measures $`SU(3)`$ breaking, there is a basis of operators. The construction of these bases is straightforward, and the operators are listed in Table 1. The corresponding matrix elements between the states belonging to the $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔},2^+]`$ multiplet are given in Tables 2 and 3. Note that the operators used in the analysis of the $`[\mathrm{𝟕𝟎},1^{}]`$ masses are reduced to the operators given here in Table 1. This can be shown using reductions, valid for the symmetric representation, of matrix elements involving excited quark and/or core operators, such as:

$`\mathrm{Sym}s_i\mathrm{Sym}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N_c}}\mathrm{Sym}S_i\mathrm{Sym}`$ (6)
$`\mathrm{Sym}S_i^c\mathrm{Sym}`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{N_c1}{N_c}}\mathrm{Sym}S_i\mathrm{Sym},\mathrm{etc}.,`$
where $`S=s+S^c`$, $`s`$ being the spin operator acting only on one quark (the excited one for instance), and $`S^c`$ acts on the remaining $`(N_c1)`$ core quarks. Similarly, relations for two-body operators can also be derived, e.g.:

$`\mathrm{Sym}s_iG_{ja}^c\mathrm{Sym}`$ $`=`$ $`\mathrm{Sym}s_i(G_{ja}g_{ja})\mathrm{Sym}`$
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{N_c}}\mathrm{Sym}S_iG_{ja}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{4}}\delta _{ij}T_a{\displaystyle \frac{i}{2}}ϵ_{ijk}G_{ka})\mathrm{Sym}`$
An important observation is that in the present case there is no $`SU(3)`$ singlet operator breaking spin-flavor symmetry at $`𝒪(N_c^0)`$. In particular, operators involving the $`O(3)`$ generators, that in the mixed-symmetric spin-flavor representations can be $`𝒪(N_c^0)`$, are demoted to $`𝒪(1/N_c)`$ in the spin-flavor symmetric representation. At $`𝒪(N_c^1)`$ only two singlet operators appear, the spin-orbit operator $`O_2`$ and the hyperfine operator $`O_3`$, both being two-body operators. At order $`ϵ`$ there is one operator $`𝒪(N_c^0)`$, namely $`\overline{B}_1`$ and two operators $`𝒪(N_c^1)`$, namely $`\overline{B}_{2,3}`$.

Note that in the $`\mathrm{𝟓𝟔}`$-plet there are no state mixings in the $`SU(3)`$ symmetric limit. Only the operator $`\overline{B}_2`$ induces mixings. The mixings affect the octet and decuplet $`\mathrm{\Sigma }^{(\mathrm{𝟖}),(\mathrm{𝟏𝟎})}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Xi }^{(\mathrm{𝟖}),(\mathrm{𝟏𝟎})}`$ states, and in the limit of isospin symmetry there are four mixing angles, namely $`\theta _J^{\mathrm{\Sigma },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}}`$ and $`\theta _J^{\mathrm{\Xi },\mathrm{\Xi }^{}}`$ with $`J=3/2,5/2`$. The physical states are given by $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_J=\mathrm{\Sigma }_J^{(\mathrm{𝟖})}\mathrm{cos}\theta _J^{\mathrm{\Sigma },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}}+\mathrm{\Sigma }_J^{(\mathrm{𝟏𝟎})}\mathrm{sin}\theta _J^{\mathrm{\Sigma },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}}`$ and $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_J^{}=\mathrm{\Sigma }_J^{(\mathrm{𝟖})}\mathrm{sin}\theta _J^{\mathrm{\Sigma },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}}+\mathrm{\Sigma }_J^{(\mathrm{𝟏𝟎})}\mathrm{cos}\theta _J^{\mathrm{\Sigma },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}}`$ and in a similar way for the cascades. The mixing angles are determined by the ratio of the matrix elements of the operator $`\overline{B}_2`$ to the spin-flavor mass splitting induced by the $`𝒪(N_c^1)`$ singlet operators. This implies that the mixing angles are $`𝒪(ϵN_c^0)`$. The mixings affect the mass eigenvalues at $`𝒪(ϵ^2/N_c)`$, which is beyond the accuracy of the present analysis.

Since there are twenty four independent masses in the isospin symmetric limit, and the basis consists of six operators, there are eighteen mass relations that hold independently of the values of the coefficients $`c_i`$ and $`b_i`$. These relations are depicted in Table 4. In addition to the Gell-Mann Okubo (GMO) relations for each octet (two such relations) and the equal spacing relations (EQS) for each decuplet (eight such relations), there are eight relations that involve states belonging to different $`SU(3)`$ multiplets as well as different values of $`J`$: the first three in the Table 4 involve only the masses of non-strange states, while the remaining five relations have been chosen in such a way that several of them can be tested directly with the available data. These latter eight relations provide a useful test of the validity of the $`1/N_c`$ expansion as implemented in this analysis. The GMO and EQS relations cannot be tested due to the scarcity of information on strange baryons. If the one and two star states are excluded, there are four relations that can be tested, namely, the three non-strange ones (1, 2 and 3) and relation (4). If the one and two star states are included (three such states), there are three addditional relations that can be tested, namely (5, 6 and 7). In all cases they are found to be satisfied within the experimental errors. Following JL95 , in order to compare to what extent the empirical accuracies of the mass relations match the theoretical expectations, each of the mass relations in Table 4 is cast in the form $`\mathrm{LHS}=\mathrm{RHS}`$ with the left hand side (LHS) and right hand side (RHS) possessing only terms with positive coefficients. The accuracy of the mass relations is then defined as $`|\mathrm{LHS}\mathrm{RHS}|/[(\mathrm{LHS}+\mathrm{RHS})/2]`$. These ratios are $`𝒪(ϵ^2N_c^2)`$ for the GMO and EQS relations, and $`𝒪(N_c^3)`$, $`𝒪(ϵ^2N_c^2)`$ and/or $`𝒪(ϵN_c^3)`$ for the others. For $`N_c=3`$, and $`ϵ1/3`$, the ratios associated with the relations (1) to (8) in Table 4 are estimated to be of the order of $`4\%`$. The ratios obtained with the physical masses are listed in the last column of Table 4, and they are within that estimated theoretical range. It is important to emphasize that all these empirically verified relations represent a genuine test of spin-flavor symmetry and its breaking according to the $`1/N_c`$ expansion, as pointed out above. The fact that they are all verified to the expected accuracy is remarkable and gives strong support to the analysis based on the premises of this work.

The fit to the available data, where states with three or more stars in the Particle Data Listings are included, leads to the effective constants $`c_i`$ and $`b_i`$ shown in Table 1 and the results for the masses shown in Table 5, where fourteen of them are predictions. The $`\chi _{\mathrm{dof}}^2`$ of the fit is 0.7, where the number of degrees of freedom (dof) is equal to four. The errors shown for the predictions in Table 5 are obtained propagating the errors of the coefficients in Table 1. There is also a systematic error $`𝒪(N_c^2)`$, resulting from having included only operators up to $`𝒪(N_c^1)`$ in the analysis, which can be roughly estimated to be around 30 MeV.

In Table 5 the partial contributions from each operator to the mass of the different members of the multiplet are also shown. The operator $`O_1`$ provides the spin-flavor singlet mass of about 1625 MeV. The breaking of spin-flavor symmetry by the $`SU(3)`$ singlet operators is essentially given in its entirety by the hyperfine interaction $`O_3`$, that produces a splitting between octet and decuplet states of approximately $`240`$ MeV, while the spin-orbit operator $`O_2`$ is rather irrelevant inducing spin-flavor breaking mass shifts of less than 30 MeV. Note that $`O_2`$ is the sole source of the splittings between the two N states and also between the $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$ states. The weakness of $`O_2`$ is thus very convincingly established.

The breaking of $`SU(3)`$ is dominated by the operator $`\overline{B}_1`$, which gives a shift of about 200 MeV per unit of strangeness. The main role of the subleading operators $`\overline{B}_{2,3}`$ is to provide the observed $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ splittings in the octets, and the different splittings between the $`N`$ and the average $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ masses in the two octets, and the $`\mathrm{\Sigma }\mathrm{\Delta }`$ splitting in the $`J=7/2`$ decuplet. Finally, $`\overline{B}_2`$ gives the only contributions to the state mixings. The mixing angles that result from the fit are: $`\theta _{3/2}^{\mathrm{\Sigma },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}}=0.16`$, $`\theta _{5/2}^{\mathrm{\Sigma },\mathrm{\Sigma }^{}}=0.26`$, $`\theta _{3/2}^{\mathrm{\Xi },\mathrm{\Xi }^{}}=0.21`$ and $`\theta _{5/2}^{\mathrm{\Xi },\mathrm{\Xi }^{}}=0.19`$ (in radians).

The better established $`\mathrm{\Lambda }\mathrm{\Sigma }`$ splitting in the $`J=5/2`$ octet is almost 100 MeV, while the other splitting in the $`J=1/2`$ octet is small and slightly negative. The latter one involves however the one star state $`\mathrm{\Sigma }(1840)`$, which might also be assigned to the radially excited $`\mathrm{𝟓𝟔}^{}`$. The large $`N_c`$ analysis implies that these splittings are $`𝒪(ϵ/N_c)`$, and are produced only by the operators $`\overline{B}_2`$ and $`\overline{B}_3`$. The result from the fit indicates that the $`\mathrm{\Lambda }_{5/2}\mathrm{\Sigma }_{5/2}`$ receives a contribution of 63 MeV from $`\overline{B}_3`$ and 40 MeV from $`\overline{B}_2`$. It is interesting to observe that several mass splitting differences receive only contributions from $`\overline{B}_2`$ as it is obvious from Table 3. These involve the splittings in the octets $`(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{5/2}N_{5/2})(\mathrm{\Lambda }_{3/2}N_{3/2})`$, $`(\mathrm{\Sigma }_{5/2}N_{5/2})(\mathrm{\Sigma }_{3/2}N_{3/2})`$ and $`(\mathrm{\Xi }_{5/2}N_{5/2})(\mathrm{\Xi }_{3/2}N_{3/2})`$, and the decuplet splittings $`(\mathrm{\Sigma }_J\mathrm{\Delta }_J)(\mathrm{\Sigma }_J^{}\mathrm{\Delta }_J^{})`$, $`(\mathrm{\Xi }_J\mathrm{\Delta }_J)(\mathrm{\Xi }_J^{}\mathrm{\Delta }_J^{})`$ and $`(\mathrm{\Omega }_J\mathrm{\Delta }_J)(\mathrm{\Omega }_J^{}\mathrm{\Delta }_J^{})`$. Further information on these splittings would allow to pin down with better confidence the relevance of $`\overline{B}_2`$. The fit implies for instance that the contribution of $`\overline{B}_2`$ to the $`\mathrm{\Omega }_{1/2}\mathrm{\Omega }_{7/2}`$ splitting is about $`225\pm 100`$ MeV, a rather large effect. The operator $`\overline{B}_2`$ involves the orbital angular momentum operator, and since in all other known cases where orbital couplings occur their effects are suppressed, the same would be expected here. The naive expectation is that the coefficient of $`\overline{B}_2`$ would be of order $`2\sqrt{3}ϵ`$ times the coefficient of $`O_2`$. It is in fact substantially larger. However, this result is not very conclusive, because $`b_2`$ is largely determined by only a few inputs resulting in a rather large relative error for this parameter. Related to this, the sign of the coefficient of $`\overline{B}_2`$ determines the ascending or descending ordering of the masses of strange states in the decuplet as $`J`$ increases. In the present analysis the higher $`J`$ states are lighter. However, the structure of $`SU(3)`$ breaking splittings cannot be established better because of the rather small number of strange states available for the fit. This is perhaps the most important motivation for further experimental and lattice QCD study of the still non-observed states.

It is of interest to draw some comparisons among the analyses carried out in previous works, that include the ground state baryons Jenk1 ; JL95 , the $`[\mathrm{𝟕𝟎},1^{}]`$ baryons CCGL ; SGS , the Roper multiplet $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔}^{},0^+]`$ CC00 , and the present analysis. At the level of $`SU(3)`$ singlet operators the hyperfine interaction is $`𝒪(1/N_c)`$ in all cases. It is interesting to compare the strength of the hyperfine interaction in the different multiplets estimating the strength of the quark pairwise hyperfine interaction. In the large $`N_c`$ limit that strength should be the same for different low lying excited states. For the ground state baryons the hyperfine operator, up to terms proportional to the identity operator, is given by: $`_{ij}s_{(i)}s_{(j)}`$ where the indices $`i`$, $`j`$ run from 1 to $`N_c`$. The ground state $`\mathrm{\Delta }N`$ splitting then gives a strength of about 100 MeV for this operator. In excited states with $`\mathrm{}=1`$, the results from the $`\mathrm{𝟕𝟎}`$-plet depend in general on the mixing angles used as an input PS03 . For the particular choice of the angles used in the analyses CCGL ; CaCa98 ; SGS  the hyperfine interaction involving the excited quark and quarks in the core (the operator $`O_7`$ in SGS ) is suppressed, indicating that the hyperfine interaction is predominantly short range. The relevant hyperfine interaction is in this case the one involving the $`N_c1`$ quarks in the core, i.e., the indices $`i`$ and $`j`$ run only over the quarks in the core. This leads in the $`[\mathrm{𝟕𝟎},1^{}]`$ to a strength of about 160 MeV. In the $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔},2^+]`$, a reasonable assumption is that a single quark is excited with $`\mathrm{}=2`$. From the result obtained in the $`[\mathrm{𝟕𝟎},1^{}]`$, it is expected that the excited quark will also have negligible participation in the hyperfine interaction. This will be given essentially by the hyperfine interaction of the core quarks. Using the relation $`\left(1\frac{2}{N_c}\right)S^2=(S^c)^2\frac{3}{4}\mathrm{𝟙}`$ valid in states belonging to the symmetric spin-flavor representation, the result of the fit implies a strength of 240 MeV. In the Roper $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔}^{},0^+]`$ multiplet the situation is less clear, as all quarks may participate of the hyperfine interaction. The average strength in the core turns out to be about 160 MeV. These results indicate an increase in the strength of the hyperfine interaction in going from the ground state baryons to excited baryons. This suggests the presence of an underlying dynamical mechanism that might be possible to identify in specific models. The other $`SU(3)`$ singlet interaction common to all multiplets, the spin-orbit interaction, is weak in the two known cases, namely $`[\mathrm{𝟕𝟎},1^{}]`$ and $`[\mathrm{𝟓𝟔},2^+]`$.

The $`SU(3)`$ breaking operator $`\overline{B}_1=𝒮`$ gives a mass shift per unit of strangeness of about 200 MeV in all multiplets considered, which is in line with the the value of the strange quark mass. The operator $`l_ig_{i8}`$ which contributes at $`𝒪(ϵN_c^0)`$ in the $`\mathrm{𝟓𝟔}`$-plet and at $`𝒪(ϵ/N_c)`$ in the $`\mathrm{𝟕𝟎}`$-plet, carries coefficients of similar size but different sign. This issue can be further clarified when the role of $`\overline{B}_2`$ is better established.

###### Acknowledgements.

We thank Winston Roberts for useful comments on the manuscript. JLG thanks the Physics Department of TANDAR (Argentina) for the kind hospitality. This work was partially supported by the National Science Foundation (USA) through grant \# PHY-9733343, by the Department of Energy through contract DOE-AC05-84ER40150 (JLG) and DOE-FG02-96ER40945 (CS), and by ANPCYT (Argentina) grant PICT00-03-0858003(NNS). The authors acknowledge support from Fundación Antorchas (Argentina). NNS would also like to acknowledge support by ICTP (Trieste, Italy) during his stay at the ECT (Trento, Italy).


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# Electrons on Hexagonal lattices and applications to nanotubes

## I Introduction

Nanotubes have attracted a large amount of interest ever since they were first discovered in 1991 . They can be thought of as carbon cylinders with a hexagonal grid and are thus fullerene related structures. Their mechanical, thermal, optical and electrical properties have been studied in some detail . It was found that most properties depend crucially on the diameter, chirality and lengths of the tube. A distortion of the lattice thus affects the energy band gap. This distortion of the lattice can be achieved in two different ways: a) through an external force like e.g. bending, stretching or twisting  or b) through an internal excitation, which interacts with the lattice. It is well known that the interaction of an excitation such as an amide I- vibration in biopolymers or an electron (in the case of the Fröhlich Hamiltonian) with a lattice whose distortion is initially caused by the excitation results in the creation of a localised state which, in what follows, we refer to as a soliton. Such a soliton was first introduced by Davydov  in the 1970s to explain the dispersion free energy transport in biopolymers (see also  for further details).

Recently, a Fröhlich Hamitonian was studied on a two-dimensional, discrete, quadratic lattice . In , the existence of localised states was studied numerically and it was found that their properties depend crucially on the electron-phonon coupling constant. An analytical study confirmed these results  \- by showing that in the continuum limit the set of discrete equations reduces to a modified non-linear Schrödinger (MNLS) equation which has an additional term resulting from the discreteness of the lattice. Although a soliton of the basic NLS is unstable the extra term was shown to stabilise it for appropriate choices of the coupling constant.

In this paper, we extend the study of Refs.  to the case of a hexagonal, periodic lattice with a large extension in $`x`$ and a small extension in $`y`$ directions. We study the resultant equations both analytically and numerically. In Section II we present the Hamiltonian and the equations of motion. In Section III we discuss various properties of the equations in the stationary limit and we demonstrate the existence of an exact solution of the discrete equations. In this limit, we can thus replace the full system of equations by a modified discrete non-linear Schrödinger (DNLS) equation. In Section IV, we present and compare our numerical results for the continuous MNLS equation, for the full system of equations and for the modified DNLS equation. Most of our numerical simulations are performed for the $`(5,5)`$ armchair tube. Such nanotube was discussed in a recent paper by Liu et al. in the context of nanorings . We also discuss briefly how nanotubes with different diameter and chirality could be constructed in our model.

## II The Hamiltonian and equations of motion

### A Hamiltonian

The Hamiltonian $`H`$ of our model is a sum of four sums which result from the special features of the hexagonal grid. $`\psi _{i,j}`$ denotes the electron field on the $`i`$-th, $`j`$-th lattice side, while $`u_{i,j}`$ and $`v_{i,j}`$ are the displacements of the $`i`$-th, $`j`$-th lattice point from equilibrium in the $`x`$ direction and $`y`$ directions, respectively:

$`H`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{j1}{2}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_2}{2}1}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i1}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}3}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j+1}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j1})`$ (1)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j+1}^{}+\psi _{i1,j}^{}+\psi _{i+1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (2)
$`+`$ $`|\psi _{i,j}|^2({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i+1,j+1}+u_{i+1,j1}2u_{i1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i+1,j+1}v_{i+1,j1}))]`$ (3)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{j}{2}=1}{\overset{\frac{N_2}{2}}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i2}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}2}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j+1}+\psi _{i1,j1})`$ (4)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j+1}^{}+\psi _{i1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (5)
$`+`$ $`|\psi _{i,j}|^2({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i1,j1}u_{i1,j+1}+2u_{i+1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i1,j+1}v_{i1,j1}))]`$ (6)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{j}{2}=1}{\overset{\frac{N_2}{2}}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i3}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}1}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j+1}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j1})`$ (7)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j+1}^{}+\psi _{i1,j}^{}+\psi _{i+1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (8)
$`+`$ $`|\psi _{i,j}|^2({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i+1,j+1}+u_{i+1,j1}2u_{i1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i+1,j+1}v_{i+1,j1}))]`$ (9)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{j1}{2}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_2}{2}1}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i}{4}=1}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j+1}+\psi _{i1,j1})`$ (10)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j+1}^{}+\psi _{i1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (11)
$`+`$ $`|\psi _{i,j}|^2({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i1,j1}u_{i1,j+1}+2u_{i+1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i1,j+1}v_{i1,j1}))]`$ (12)
with the phonon energy $`W`$ :

$`W`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{N_1}{}}}\left(({\displaystyle \frac{du_{ij}}{dt}})^2+({\displaystyle \frac{dv_{ij}}{dt}})^2\right)`$ (13)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{j1}{2}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_2}{2}1}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i1}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}3}{}}}(k_x[(u_{ij}u_{i1,j})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j})^2+(u_{ij}u_{i+1,j+1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i+1,j+1})^2`$ (14)
$`+`$ $`(u_{ij}u_{i+1,j1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i+1,j1})^2])+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle }_{\frac{j}{2}=1}^{\frac{N_2}{2}}{\displaystyle }_{\frac{i2}{4}=0}^{\frac{N_1}{4}2}(k_x[(u_{ij}u_{i+1,j})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i+1,j})^2`$ (15)
$`+`$ $`(u_{ij}u_{i1,j+1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j+1})^2+(u_{ij}u_{i1,j1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j1})^2])`$ (16)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{j}{2}=1}{\overset{\frac{N_2}{2}}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i3}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}1}{}}}(k_x[(u_{ij}u_{i1,j})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j})^2+(u_{ij}u_{i+1,j+1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i+1,j+1})^2`$ (17)
$`+`$ $`(u_{ij}u_{i+1,j1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i+1,j1})^2])+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle }_{\frac{j1}{2}=0}^{\frac{N_2}{2}1}{\displaystyle }_{\frac{i}{4}=1}^{\frac{N_1}{4}}(k_x[(u_{ij}u_{i+1,j})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i+1,j})^2`$ (18)
$`+`$ $`(u_{ij}u_{i1,j+1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j+1})^2+(u_{ij}u_{i1,j1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j1})^2]).`$ (19)
$`j_x`$ is the electron field self-interaction coupling, $`c_x`$ couples the electron field to the displacement fields $`u`$ and $`v`$ and $`k_x`$ is the self-coupling of the displacement fields.

### B Equations of motion

We can easily derive the equations of motion from our Hamiltonian $`H`$. As an example we give the equations for $`i=1+4k`$. The discrete Schrödinger equation for the $`\psi _{i,j}`$ field thus becomes:

$`i\mathrm{}{\displaystyle \frac{\psi _{i,j}}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`(E+W)\psi _{i,j}2j_x\left(\psi _{i+1,j+1}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (20)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i+1,j+1}+u_{i+1,j1}2u_{i1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i+1,j+1}v_{i+1,j1})\right],`$ (21)
while the equations for the displacement fields $`u_{i,j}`$ and $`v_{i,j}`$ are given by:

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2u_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3u_{i,j}u_{i+1,j+1}u_{i1,j}u_{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (22)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3M}}\left(2|\psi _{i1,j}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2\right)`$ (23)
and

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2v_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3v_{i,j}v_{i+1,j+1}v_{i1,j}v_{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (24)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}M}}\left(|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2\right).`$ (25)
We perform the following rescalings:

$$\tau =\frac{j_xt}{\mathrm{}},U=3C_xu,V=3C_xv,E_0=\frac{E}{j_x},W_0=\frac{W}{j_x}$$
(26)
and introduce the following rescaled coupling constants:

$$C_x=\frac{c_x}{9j_x},K_x=\frac{k_x\mathrm{}^2}{j_x^2},g=\frac{2C_x^2}{E_s},E_s=\frac{Mj_x}{9\mathrm{}^2}.$$
(27)
The equations then read:

$`i{\displaystyle \frac{\psi _{i,j}}{\tau }}`$ $`=`$ $`(E_0+W_0)\psi _{i,j}2\left(\psi _{i+1,j+1}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (28)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\left[(U_{i+1,j+1}+U_{i+1,j1}2U_{i1,j})+\sqrt{3}(V_{i+1,j+1}V_{i+1,j1})\right],`$ (29)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2U_{i,j}}{d\tau ^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`K_x\left(3U_{i,j}U_{i+1,j+1}U_{i1,j}U_{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (30)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{g}{2}}\left(2|\psi _{i1,j}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2\right)`$ (31)
and

$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2V_{i,j}}{d\tau ^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`K_x\left(3V_{i,j}V_{i+1,j+1}V_{i1,j}V_{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (32)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{3}g}{2}}\left(|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2\right).`$ (33)
## III Stationary limit

In the stationary limit, we have:

$`\lambda \psi _{i,j}+2\left(3\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i+1,j+1}\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (34)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}[U_{i+1,j+1}+U_{i+1,j1}2U_{i1,j}+\sqrt{3}(V_{i+1,j+1}V_{i+1,j1})]=0`$ (35)
with $`\lambda =E_0+W_06`$ and

$`3U_{i,j}U_{i+1,j+1}U_{i1,j}U_{i+1,j1}={\displaystyle \frac{\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}}\left(2|\psi _{i1,j}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2\right)`$ (36)
$`3V_{i,j}V_{i+1,j+1}V_{i1,j}V_{i+1,j1}={\displaystyle \frac{\sqrt{3}\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}}\left(|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2\right)`$ (37)
with $`\stackrel{~}{g}=\frac{g}{K_x}`$.

### A Discrete equation

In contrast to the square grid, we find that the discrete equations of the hexagonal grid in the stationary limit do have an exact solution. We can thus replace the system of coupled equations (20)- (24) by just one modified DNLS equation. We again look at the case $`i=1+4k`$ for which we have :

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)U_{ij}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}\left(2|\psi _{i1,j}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2\right)$$

where $`\mathrm{\Delta }(1)U_{ij}=U_{i+1,j+1}+U_{i1,j}+U_{i+1,j1}3U_{i,j}`$. Analogously, we have:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)V_{ij}=\frac{\sqrt{3}\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}\left(|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2\right)$$

where $`\mathrm{\Delta }(1)V_{ij}=V_{i+1,j+1}+V_{i1,j}+V_{i+1,j1}3V_{i,j}`$. Next we note that for the three nearest neighbours we have similar relations, namely:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)U_{i+1,j+1}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}\left(|\psi _{i,j}|^2+|\psi _{i,j+2}|^22|\psi _{i+2,j+1}|^2\right),$$

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)U_{i+1,j1}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}\left(|\psi _{i,j2}|^2+|\psi _{i,j}|^22|\psi _{i+2,j1}|^2\right),$$

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)U_{i1,j}=\frac{\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}\left(|\psi _{i2,j1}|^2+|\psi _{i2,j+1}|^22|\psi _{i,j}|^2\right)$$

for the $`U`$ field and

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)V_{i+1,j+1}=\frac{\sqrt{3}\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}\left(|\psi _{ij}|^2|\psi _{i,j+2}|^2\right),$$

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)V_{i+1,j1}=\frac{\sqrt{3}\stackrel{~}{g}}{2}\left(|\psi _{i,j2}|^2|\psi _{ij}|^2\right)$$

for the $`V`$ field.

Defining: $`Z_a=U_{i+1,j+1}+U_{i+1,j1}2U_{i1,j}+\sqrt{3}(V_{i+1,j+1}V_{i+1,j1})`$ (i.e. the lattice terms in (34)) we find that the following discrete equation holds

$`\mathrm{\Delta }(1)Z_a=`$ (38)
$`\stackrel{~}{g}\left(6|\psi _{ij}|^2|\psi _{i,j+2}|^2|\psi _{i+2,j+1}|^2|\psi _{i,j2}|^2|\psi _{i+2,j1}|^2|\psi _{i2,j1}|^2|\psi _{i2,j+1}|^2\right)`$ (39)
The right hand side of (38) is a 7-point Laplacian $`\mathrm{\Delta }(2)|\psi _{ij}|^2`$, thus we find:

$$\mathrm{\Delta }(1)Z_a=\stackrel{~}{g}\mathrm{\Delta }(2)|\psi _{ij}|^2.$$
(40)
It is easy to see that one possible solution of this equation is of the form:

$$Z_a=\stackrel{~}{g}\left(|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2+|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2+|\psi _{i1,j}|^2+3|\psi _{ij}|^2\right).$$
(41)
This is quite remarkable since on a square lattice a similar equation has no simple solution. Inserting (41) into (34) we have:

$`\lambda \psi _{i,j}+2\left(3\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i+1,j+1}\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (42)
$``$ $`\stackrel{~}{g}\psi _{i,j}[|\psi _{i+1,j+1}|^2+|\psi _{i+1,j1}|^2+|\psi _{i1,j}|^2+3|\psi _{ij}|^2]=0`$ (43)
or

$$\lambda \psi _{i,j}2\mathrm{\Delta }(1)\psi _{ij}\stackrel{~}{g}\psi _{i,j}\left(\mathrm{\Delta }(1)|\psi _{i,j}|^2+6|\psi _{ij}|^2\right)=0.$$
(44)
This equation constitutes our discrete nonlinear Schrödinger (DNLS) equation.

### B Continuum limit

Next we look at the continuum limit of (44). To do this we introduce the following expansions:

$`\psi _{i\pm 1,j+1}`$ $`=`$ $`\psi \pm \delta x_\pm {\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{x}}+\delta y{\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{y}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\delta x_\pm )^2{\displaystyle \frac{^2\psi }{x^2}}\pm \delta y\delta x_\pm {\displaystyle \frac{^2\psi }{xy}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\delta y)^2{\displaystyle \frac{^2\psi }{y^2}}`$ (45)
$`\pm `$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{8}}(\delta x_\pm )^3{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{x^3}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\delta x_\pm )^2\delta y{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{x^2y}}\pm {\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\delta x_\pm (\delta y)^2{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{xy^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{8}}(\delta y_\pm )^3{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{y^3}}\pm \mathrm{}`$ (46)
and

$`\psi _{i\pm 1,j1}`$ $`=`$ $`\psi \pm \delta x_\pm {\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{x}}\delta y{\displaystyle \frac{\psi }{y}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\delta x_\pm )^2{\displaystyle \frac{^2\psi }{x^2}}\delta y\delta x_\pm {\displaystyle \frac{^2\psi }{xy}}+{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\delta y)^2{\displaystyle \frac{^2\psi }{y^2}}`$ (47)
$`\pm `$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{8}}(\delta x_\pm )^3{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{x^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}(\delta x_\pm )^2\delta y{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{x^2y}}\pm {\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}\delta x_\pm (\delta y)^2{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{xy^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{1}{8}}(\delta y_\pm )^3{\displaystyle \frac{^3\psi }{y^3}}\pm \mathrm{}`$ (48)
where for $`i=1+4k`$ and $`i=3+4k`$ we have $`\delta x_+=1/2`$, $`\delta x_{}=1`$, while for $`i=2+4k`$ and $`i=4+4k`$ we have $`\delta x_+=1`$, $`\delta x_{}=1/2`$. Moreover, $`\delta y=\sqrt{3}/2`$. Inserting this into (44), we obtain:

$$\lambda \psi \frac{3}{2}\mathrm{\Delta }\psi \stackrel{~}{g}\psi \left(\frac{3}{4}\mathrm{\Delta }|\psi |^2+6|\psi |^2\right)=0$$
(49)
or, equivalently,

$$\stackrel{~}{\lambda }\psi +\mathrm{\Delta }\psi +4\stackrel{~}{g}\psi \left(|\psi |^2+\frac{1}{8}\mathrm{\Delta }|\psi |^2\right)=0$$
(50)
We thus have, in analogy to what was found in , a modified nonlinear Schrödinger (MNLS) equation with an extra term, which can stabilise the soliton:

$$i\frac{\psi }{\tau }+\mathrm{\Delta }\psi +4\stackrel{~}{g}\psi \left(|\psi |^2+\frac{1}{8}\mathrm{\Delta }|\psi |^2\right)=0.$$
(51)
Following  we see that the conserved energy in this case is given by:

$$=\left(|\stackrel{}{}\psi |^22\stackrel{~}{g}|\psi |^4+\frac{\stackrel{~}{g}}{4}(\stackrel{}{}|\psi |^2)^2\right)𝑑x𝑑y.$$
(52)
Approximating the soliton solution of (21) by a Gaussian of the form $`\psi (x,y)=\frac{\kappa }{\sqrt{\pi }}\mathrm{exp}(\frac{\kappa ^2}{2}(x^2+y^2))`$ we find that the value of $`\kappa `$ that minimises the energy is

$$\kappa _{min}^2=2(1\frac{\pi }{\stackrel{~}{g}})$$
(53)
and thus we have an estimate of the critical $`\stackrel{~}{g}`$, namely, $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{cr}\pi `$.

## IV Numerical results

### A Continuous, modified non-linear Schrödinger (MNLS) equation

First, we have considered the continuous, modified non-linear Schrödinger equation (51). For this, we have taken the radially symmetric ansatz:

$$\psi (r,t)=e^{i\alpha t}R(r),$$
(54)
and put this into (21). Then we have solved the ordinary differential equation (ODE) using a collocation method for the boundary value ODEs  and choosing the boundary conditions:

$$\frac{R(r)}{r}|_{r=0}=0,R(r=\mathrm{})=0.$$
(55)
Our results are shown in Fig. 1. For a fixed $`\stackrel{~}{g}`$ we have determined the value of the function $`R(r)`$ at the origin, $`R(r=0)`$, as well as the value of $`\alpha `$ for which the norm of the solution is equal to unity. As can be seen from Fig. 1, we have found that for a critical value of $`\stackrel{~}{g}=\stackrel{~}{g}_{cr}2.94`$ the value of $`R(0)`$ tends to zero. Since our construction is such that the maximum of the solution is located at $`r=0`$, the value of the height of the solution tends to zero and thus the solution ceases to exist. We thus find that the critical value of $`\stackrel{~}{g}`$ from our numerical construction agrees with the upper-bound value obtained from the variational approach based on the Gaussian, namely, $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{cr}=\pi `$.

Note that the solutions cease to exist when the value of $`\alpha `$ tends to zero. Since we can interpret $`\alpha `$ as the frequency of an internal rotation, the solutions apparently cease to exist when there is no internal rotation. This can be compared to the so-called “Q-balls” which are non-topological solitons characterized also by a complex scalar field  of the form similar to (54). For them its is known that there exist upper and lower positive-valued bounds on the frequency of the internal rotation in order for Q-balls to be stable. In comparison, our solutions exist for all values of $`\alpha >0`$. This is probably due to the fact that while the dynamical part of our action is similar to that for Q-balls, we have a extra term involving derivatives as compared to an “ordinary” $`\psi ^6`$-potential in the case of Q-balls.

### B Discrete equations

#### 1 Full system of equations

For our numerical study of the full equations (20)-(24) we have found it convenient to “squeeze” the lattice as indicated in Figs. 2a und 2b. The Hamiltonian and the corresponding equations are given in the Appendix. For our numerical calculations, we have used mainly a periodic grid with $`N_1=160`$ and $`N_2=20`$. We have in addition chosen the boundary conditions such that the fields at $`(i=0,j)`$ are identified with those at $`(i=i_{max},j)`$. Thus the type of nanotube we are studying here is a $`(5,5)`$ armchair tube which is metallic . Nanotubes can also be semiconducting and we make a brief comment about the possibility of constructing semiconducting tubes in our model in the last paragraph of this section.

In this work, the C-C bond length, $`0.1415`$ nm , is normalised to unity. Therefore, the tube diameter is $`0.6756`$ nm. Tubes with different diameter can also be constructed in our model. We discuss this together with different chiralities in the last paragraph of this section.

As starting configuration we have used an exponential-like excitation $`\psi _{i,j}`$ extended typically over the lattice points $`i=7883`$ and $`j=37`$ with the lattice at equilibrium everywhere, i.e. $`u_{i,j}=0`$ and $`v_{i,j}=0`$ for all $`i,j`$. We are mainly interested in the existence of solitons and their dependence on the value of the coupling constant $`c_x`$. We have set $`j_x=k_x=1`$, $`M=20`$ and $`E=0.142312`$. The main goal of this work is to study the dependence on $`c_x`$. So the exact values of $`j_x`$ and $`k_x`$ play a minor role. Hence, we have set them to one. The choice of $`M=20`$ is a reflection of the physical fact that the mass of the carbon atom is approximately $`2010^{24}g`$.

To absorb the energy thus allowing the initial configuration to evolve into the stationary solutions of (20)-(24), i.e. of (34)-(37) we have additionally introduced damping terms $`\nu \frac{du_{i,j}}{dt}`$ and $`\nu \frac{dv_{i,j}}{dt}`$, respectively, into the equations (22) and (24). We have typically chosen $`\nu =0.250.75`$. For this choice of the coupling constants, we have performed several numerical calculations using a $`4`$th order Runge-Kutta method for simulating the time evolution. We have found that solitons exist in this system for $`c_x20`$. For larger values of $`c_x`$, the soliton forms very quickly, while decreasing $`c_x`$ the time increases at which a soliton forms. This is of course due to the weaker coupling between the dynamics of the lattice itself and the excitation. For $`c_x=19`$, we have waited until $`t8000`$ and haven’t found a soliton. Moreover, in all cases we have found only little displacement of the lattice from the equilibrium. We have found that at the location of the soliton the lattice becomes squeezed (i.e. the lattice sites move towards the sites at which the soliton is located). This is demonstrated in Fig. 3 for $`c_x=25`$, where we show the lattice distortion after $`t=4000`$. The point at which the centre of the soliton is located doesn’t move, while the sites in its close neighbourhood all move towards the centre of the soliton.

We have also studied the effects of perturbations of the solitons. We have found that after perturbing the soliton we obtain a new solution with a different height of the soliton maximum. Even after introducing a perturbation which keeps the maximal height fixed, the new solution differs from the starting one. We thus come to the conclusion that the full system of equations (20)-(24) has a large number of solutions for each choice of coupling constants. We believe that a conserved quantity exists in this system which picks out the specific solution. However, so far we have not been able to determine this conserved quantity.

#### 2 Modified, discrete non-linear Schrödinger (DNLS) equation

In addition to the full system of equations, we have also studied the dynamical analog of equation (42). Using a similar starting configuration with $`\psi _{i,j}`$ being exponential and nonzero over $`i=7883`$ and $`j=37`$, we have determined the value of $`\stackrel{~}{g}`$ for which a soliton exists. Our results are shown in Fig. 4 where we present the height of the soliton’s maximum $`(\psi \psi ^{})_{max}`$ as function of $`\stackrel{~}{g}`$. We find that the value of $`\stackrel{~}{g}`$ at which the soliton disappears $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{cr}2.295`$. The height of the soliton at this critical coupling is $`(\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{})_{max}0.227`$. Our numerical study of the continuous MNLS equation gave us $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{cr}2.94`$, while the analytic study led to $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{cr}=\pi `$. Both values are not a bad approximation for the value found numerically for the discrete equation.

To test the independence of our results from the form of the initial settings, we have used a different starting configuration with two exponential-like excitations being located at $`i=7883`$, $`j=37`$ and $`i=138143`$ and $`j=1317`$, respectively. We have found that for values $`\stackrel{~}{g}3`$, the results agree. For both types of initial configurations, the minimal energy configuration corresponds to one soliton. However, having said this, the time to reach this minimal energy configurations is significantly smaller for the initial configuration with one excitation than for that with two (typically one order of magnitude smaller). We have also tested our results as to the dependence on the size of the grid. For this, we have chosen two excitations on three different grid sizes: a) a grid with $`N_1=160`$, $`N_2=20`$ and two exponential excitations extended over $`i=7883`$, $`j=37`$ and $`i=138143`$, $`j=1317`$, respectively, b) a grid with $`N_1=320`$ and $`N_2=40`$ with the excitations located at the same places than in a), and finally c) a grid with $`N_1=60`$, $`N_2=10`$ and two exponential excitations extended over $`i=1823`$, $`j=24`$ and $`i=3843`$, $`j=79`$, respectively. We have found that for $`\stackrel{~}{g}=3`$, the results of cases a) and c) agree. For the case a) the soliton forms at $`t300`$, while for the case c) it forms at $`t100`$. This is not suprising since in the case c), the two excitations are located nearer to each other than in the case a). To test the dependence on the actual lattice size we have compared the cases a) and b). We have found that the larger the lattice the longer it takes for the soliton to form. For $`\stackrel{~}{g}=3`$ a soliton forms after $`t300`$ in the case a), while for b) it forms at $`t>700`$. We have thus found that, in comparison with the case of the full system of equations, the solutions of the DNLS equation are unique for each choice of the coupling constant.

#### 3 Comparison of results

Since we have found that in the stationary limit the full system of equations can be replaced by a DNLS equation, the minimal energy solutions we have obtained for both types of equations should be in agreement.

Comparing the two systems, we see that the value $`\stackrel{~}{g}`$ is given in terms of the coupling constants of the full system by:

$$\stackrel{~}{g}=\frac{2}{9}\frac{c_x^2}{Mj_xk_x}$$
(56)
which, for the choice of coupling constants we have used in our numerical simulations, gives:

$$\stackrel{~}{g}=\frac{c_x^2}{90}.$$
(57)
Thus a critical value of $`c_x20`$ would imply $`\stackrel{~}{g}_{cr}4.4`$. First, we remark that the values of the critical electron-phonon coupling we obtained from all our simulations (including those for the continuous MNLS equation) are of the same order of magnitude. However, there is a slight discrepancy between the results for the full system and the DNLS equation. We believe that this is due to the fact that there might exist additional terms $`𝒜`$ in (41) for which $`\mathrm{\Delta }(1)𝒜=0`$ and/or $`\mathrm{\Delta }(2)𝒜=0`$. These terms would then appear in (42) and would change the comparison of the solutions. However, it is difficult to determine these additional terms and so this is left as a future work .

#### 4 Tubes with different diameter, chirality and lengths

Since most of our results are for a $`(5,5)`$ armchair tube and since it is well known that the properties of nanotubes depend strongly on the diameter, chirality and lengths of the tube, we will discuss briefly how different tubes could be constructed in our model. We haven’t constructed these tubes yet, but we aim to do so in a future publication in which we intend to extend our approach to a more realistic three dimensional model .

Labelling the first carbon atom in $`y`$ direction by $`j=0`$, we have chosen $`j_{max}`$ such that it is divisable by $`4`$. Thus, the length of the tube in the $`y`$-direction is $`l_y=\frac{3}{4}j_{max}`$. Since we identify the fields labelled by $`(i=0,j)`$ with those at $`(i=i_{max},j)`$, the diameter of the tube is given by $`d=l_y/\pi `$. Thus increasing/decreasing $`j_{max}`$ by $`4n`$, $`n=1,2,3\mathrm{}`$, we can construct armchair nanotubes with diameters $`d=\frac{3}{4\pi }(j_{max}\pm 4n)`$. Similarly, we can construct longer tubes by increasing the number of atoms in the $`x`$ direction.

As far as chirality is concerned, there are two things to modify in our model in order to be able to construct tubes with different chirality. One is to change the number of points in the $`y`$ direction so that $`j_{max}`$ is non-divisable by $`4`$. The other is to adjust the periodic boundary conditions in the $`y`$-direction appropriately. If we e.g. choose $`j_{max}=18`$, we have to identify the fields at $`(i=0,j)`$ with those at $`(i=i_{max},j+1)`$. This then would give us a $`(5,4)`$ nanotube which would be semi-conducting.

In this work, we have concentrated our attention on the existence of localised structures. These structures extend over large parts of our grids, but are negligible at boundaries. Hence, we expect these to hold for systems with different boundary conditions, i.e. different chiralities.

## V Conclusions

Motivated by a large amount of research done in the area of nanotubes, we have studied solitons on a $`2`$-dimensional hexagonal lattice. We have chosen our lattice to be periodic in both the $`x`$ and $`y`$ directions and to be of large extention in one (the $`x`$) direction and of small extention in the other (the $`y`$) direction. In the stationary limit, we have found that the full system of equations in which the electron excitation is coupled to the displacement fields of the lattice can be replaced by a modified discrete non-linear Schrödinger (DNLS) equation. This discovery of an exact solution of the full system of equations is remarkable since for the similar quadratic lattice such a simple solution does not exist.

In our numerical studies we have mainly concentrated our attention on determining the value of the critical phonon-electron coupling constant. For the DNLS we have found that unique solutions exist and that the value of the critical coupling is in good agreement with both the analytically and numerically values found for the continuous analog of the DNLS. For the full system of equations, we believe that a large number of solutions exist for each choice of the coupling constants and that a conserved quantity exists in the system. The critical value of the electron-phonon coupling is of the same order of magnitude as in the case of the DNLS; however, we believe that this small discrepancy results from the fact that possible “boundary” terms appear when replacing the full system by the DNLS. These boundary terms are terms which are annihilated by either the $`4`$-point Laplacian $`\mathrm{\Delta }(1)`$ and/or by the $`7`$-point Laplacian $`\mathrm{\Delta }(2)`$. To find these terms is non-trivial and since this seems an interesting topic by itself, we leave this as a future work .

Finally let us mention that a possible extension of the results given here would involve the study of the corresponding three dimensional equations and/or of the influence of external forces.
Acknowledgements BH was supported by an EPSRC grant.

## VI Appendix

### A Hamiltonian and Equations of motion for the numerical studies

To simplify the numerical construction of the solutions we have squeezed the lattice as indicated in Fig.s 2a, 2b. This reduces the memory requirements and so speeds up the calculations. The Hamiltonian $`H^n`$ for the numerical construction thus takes the form

$`H^n`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i1}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}3}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j1})`$ (58)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j}^{}+\psi _{i+1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (59)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i+1,j}+u_{i+1,j1}2u_{i1,j}){\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i+1,j1}v_{i+1,j}))]`$ (60)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i2}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}2}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i1,j+1})`$ (61)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j+1}^{}\right)`$ (62)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i1,j}u_{i1,j+1}+2u_{i+1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i1,j+1}v_{i1,j}))]`$ (63)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i3}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}1}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j+1})`$ (64)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j}^{}+\psi _{i+1,j+1}^{}\right)`$ (65)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i+1,j}+u_{i+1,j+1}2u_{i1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i+1,j+1}v_{i+1,j}))]`$ (66)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i}{4}=1}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}}{}}}[(E+W)\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}j_x\psi _{i,j}^{}(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i1,j1})`$ (67)
$``$ $`j_x\psi _{i,j}\left(\psi _{i+1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j}^{}+\psi _{i1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (68)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\psi _{i,j}^{}({\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i1,j}+u_{i1,j1}2u_{i+1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i1,j}v_{i1,j1}))]`$ (69)
with the phonon energy $`W^n`$ :

$`W^n`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{i=1}{\overset{N_1}{}}}\left(({\displaystyle \frac{du}{dt}})^2+({\displaystyle \frac{dv}{dt}})^2+k_x[(u_{ij}u_{i1,j})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j})^2]\right)`$ (70)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i2}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}2}{}}}\left(k_x[(u_{ij}u_{i1,j+1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i1,j+1})^2]\right)`$ (71)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{2}}M{\displaystyle \underset{j=1}{\overset{N_2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{\frac{i3}{4}=0}{\overset{\frac{N_1}{4}1}{}}}\left(k_x[(u_{ij}u_{i+1,j+1})^2+(v_{ij}v_{i+1,j+1})^2]\right).`$ (72)
The equations of motion are then given by

* For $`i=1+4k`$, $`k=1,2\mathrm{}`$:

$`i\mathrm{}{\displaystyle \frac{\psi _{i,j}}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`(E+W)\psi _{i,j}2j_x\left(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (73)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i+1,j}+u_{i+1,j1}2u_{i1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i+1,j}v_{i+1,j1})\right]`$ (74)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2u_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3u_{i,j}u_{i+1,j}u_{i1,j}u_{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (75)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3M}}\left(2\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i1,j}^{}\psi _{i+1,j}\psi _{i+1,j}^{}\psi _{i+1,j1}\psi _{i+1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (76)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2v_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3v_{i,j}v_{i+1,j}v_{i1,j}v_{i+1,j1}\right)`$ (77)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}M}}\left(\psi _{i+1,j1}\psi _{i+1,j1}^{}\psi _{i+1,j}\psi _{i+1,j}^{}\right)`$ (78)
* For $`i=2+4k`$, $`k=1,2\mathrm{}`$:

$`i\mathrm{}{\displaystyle \frac{\psi _{i,j}}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`(E+W)\psi _{i,j}2j_x\left(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i1,j+1}\right)`$ (79)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i1,j}u_{i1,j+1}+2u_{i+1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i1,j+1}v_{i1,j})\right]`$ (80)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2u_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3u_{i,j}u_{i+1,j}u_{i1,j}u_{i1,j+1}\right)`$ (81)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3M}}\left(2\psi _{i+1,j}\psi _{i+1,j}^{}\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i1,j}^{}\psi _{i1,j+1}\psi _{i1,j+1}^{}\right)`$ (82)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2v_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3v_{i,j}v_{i+1,j}v_{i1,j}v_{i1,j+1}\right)`$ (83)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}M}}\left(\psi _{i1,j+1}\psi _{i1,j+1}^{}\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i1,j}^{}\right)`$ (84)
* For $`i=3+4k`$, $`k=1,2\mathrm{}`$:

$`i\mathrm{}{\displaystyle \frac{\psi _{i,j}}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`(E+W)\psi _{i,j}2j_x\left(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i+1,j+1}\right)`$ (85)
$`+`$ $`\psi _{i,j}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i+1,j}+u_{i+1,j+1}2u_{i1,j})+{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i+1,j+1}v_{i+1,j})\right]`$ (86)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2u_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3u_{i,j}u_{i+1,j}u_{i1,j}u_{i+1,j+1}\right)`$ (87)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3M}}\left(2\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i1,j}^{}\psi _{i+1,j}\psi _{i+1,j}^{}\psi _{i+1,j+1}\psi _{i+1,j+1}^{}\right)`$ (88)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2v_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3v_{i,j}v_{i+1,j}v_{i1,j}v_{i+1,j+1}\right)`$ (89)
$``$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}M}}\left(\psi _{i+1,j}\psi _{i+1,j}^{}\psi _{i+1,j+1}\psi _{i+1,j+1}^{}\right)`$ (90)
* For $`i=4+4k`$, $`k=1,2\mathrm{}`$:

$`i\mathrm{}{\displaystyle \frac{\psi _{i,j}}{t}}`$ $`=`$ $`(E+W)\psi _{i,j}2j_x\left(\psi _{i+1,j}+\psi _{i1,j}+\psi _{i1,j1}\right)`$ (91)
$``$ $`\psi _{i,j}\left[{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3}}(u_{i1,j}+u_{i1,j1}2u_{i+1,j}){\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}}}(v_{i1,j}v_{i1,j1})\right]`$ (92)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2u_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3u_{i,j}u_{i+1,j}u_{i1,j}u_{i1,j1}\right)`$ (93)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{3M}}\left(2\psi _{i+1,j}\psi _{i+1,j}^{}\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i1,j}^{}\psi _{i1,j1}\psi _{i1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (94)
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d^2v_{i,j}}{dt^2}}`$ $`=`$ $`k_x\left(3v_{i,j}v_{i+1,j}v_{i1,j}v_{i1,j1}\right)`$ (95)
$`+`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{c_x}{\sqrt{3}M}}\left(\psi _{i1,j}\psi _{i1,j}^{}\psi _{i1,j1}\psi _{i1,j1}^{}\right)`$ (96)


text:
# Supersolvable LL-lattices of binary trees

## 1 Introduction

The aim of this article is to continue the study of some posets on forests of binary leaf-labeled trees introduced by the second author in . These posets have already been shown in  to have nice properties. The main result there was the fact that the characteristic polynomials of all intervals in these posets factorize completely with positive integer roots. By a theorem of Stanley , this property is true in general for the so-called semimodular supersolvable lattices. Since these intervals are not semimodular in general, one can not use this theorem to recover the result of . For a class of lattices, called LL-lattices, containing the semimodular-supersolvable ones, a theorem due to Blass and Sagan  generalizes Stanley’s theorem.

The first main theorem of our article states that these intervals are indeed lattices, which was not known before. The proof uses a new description of the intervals using admissible partitions. Our second main result is the fact that these lattices are supersolvable. We prove it by giving explicit $`S_n`$ EL-labelings and using the recent criterion of McNamara . As third result, we show that these intervals are LL-lattices and, using the theorem of Blass and Sagan mentioned above, we give a different proof of the factorization of characteristic polynomials and the explicit description of roots which were found in .

## 2 Notation, definitions and preliminaries

In this section we give some definitions, notation and results that will be used in the rest of this work. Let $`:=\{1,2,3,\mathrm{}\}`$ and $``$ the set of integers. For every $`n`$ let $`[n]:=\{1,2,\mathrm{},n\}`$. The cardinality of a finite set $`A`$ is denoted by $`|A|`$.

### 2.1 Posets

We follow Chapter 3 of  for any undefined notation and terminology concerning posets. Given a finite poset $`(P,)`$ and $`x,yP`$ with $`xy`$ we let $`[x,y]:=\{zP:xzy\}`$ and call this an interval of $`P`$. We denote by $`\mathrm{Int}(P)`$ the set of all intervals of $`P`$. We say that $`y`$ covers $`x`$, denoted $`xy`$, if $`|[x,y]|=2`$. A poset is said to be bounded if it has one minimal and one maximal element, denoted by $`\widehat{0}`$ and $`\widehat{1}`$ respectively. The Möbius function of $`P`$, $`\mu :\mathrm{Int}(P)`$, is defined recursively by

$$\mu (x,y):=\{\begin{array}{cc}1\hfill & \text{if }x=y,\hfill \\ _{xz<y}\mu (x,z)\hfill & \text{if }xy.\hfill \end{array}$$

If $`x,yP`$ are such that $`\{zP:zx,zy\}`$ has a minimum element then we call it the join of $`x`$ and $`y`$, denoted by $`xy`$. Similarly, we define the meet of $`x`$ and $`y`$ if $`\{zP:zx,zy\}`$ has a maximum element, denoted by $`xy`$. A lattice is a poset $`L`$ for which every pair of elements has a meet and a join. A well-known criterion is the following (see e.g. \[9, Proposition 3.3.1\]).

###### Proposition 2.1

If $`P`$ is a finite poset with $`\widehat{1}`$ such that every pair of elements has a meet then $`P`$ is a lattice.

A lattice $`L`$ that satisfies the following condition

$$\mathrm{if}x\mathrm{and}y\mathrm{both}\mathrm{cover}xy,\mathrm{then}xy\mathrm{covers}\mathrm{both}x\mathrm{and}y,$$
(1)
is said to be semimodular. The set of atoms of a finite lattice $`L`$, i.e. the elements $`a`$ covering $`\widehat{0}`$, is denoted by $`\text{A}(L)`$.

### 2.2 Edge-labelings

If $`x,yP`$, with $`xy`$, a chain from $`x`$ to $`y`$ of length $`k`$ is a $`(k+1)`$-tuple $`(x_0,x_1,\mathrm{},x_k)`$ such that $`x=x_0<x_1<\mathrm{}<x_k=y`$. A chain $`x_0x_1\mathrm{}x_k`$ is said to be saturated. A poset $`P`$ with a $`\widehat{0}`$ is said to be graded if, for any $`xP`$, all saturated chains from $`\widehat{0}`$ to $`x`$ have the same length, called the rank of $`x`$ and denoted by $`\mathrm{rk}(x)`$. We denote by $`(P)`$ the set of all maximal chains of $`P`$.

A function $`\lambda :\{(x,y)P^2:xy\}`$ is an edge-labeling of $`P`$. For any saturated chain $`m:x=x_0x_1\mathrm{}x_k=y`$ of the interval $`[x,y]`$ we set

$$\lambda (m)=(\lambda (x_0,x_1),\lambda (x_1,x_2),\mathrm{},\lambda (x_{k1},x_k)).$$

The chain $`m`$ is said to be increasing if $`\lambda (x_0,x_1)\lambda (x_1,x_2)\mathrm{}\lambda (x_{k1},x_k)`$. Let $`_L`$ be the lexicographic order on finite integer sequences, i.e. $`(a_1,\mathrm{},a_k)<_L(b_1,\mathrm{},b_k)`$ if and only if $`a_i<b_i`$ where $`i=`$ min$`\{j[k]:a_jb_j\}`$.

An edge-labeling of $`P`$ is said to be an EL-$`labeling`$ if the following two conditions are satisfied:

* Every interval $`[x,y]`$ has exactly one increasing saturated chain $`m`$.
* Any other saturated chain $`m^{}`$ from $`x`$ to $`y`$ satisfies $`\lambda (m)<_L\lambda (m^{})`$.

A graded poset is said to be edge-wise lexicographically shellable or EL-$`shellable`$, if it has an EL-labeling. EL-shellable posets were first introduced by Björner . Several connections with shellable, Cohen-Macaulay complexes and Cohen-Macaulay posets can be found in the survey paper . In particular EL-shellable posets are Cohen-Macaulay .

A particular class of EL-labelings has an interesting property.

An EL-labeling $`\lambda `$ is said an $`S_n`$ EL-labeling if, for any maximal chain $`m:\widehat{0}=x_0x_1\mathrm{}x_n=\widehat{1}`$ of $`P`$, the label $`\lambda (m)`$ is a permutation of $`[n]`$. If a poset $`P`$ has an $`S_n`$ EL-labeling, then it is said to be $`S_n`$ EL-shellable.

Following , we introduce the following definition. A finite lattice $`L`$ is said to be supersolvable if it contains a maximal chain, called an $`M`$-chain of $`L`$, which together with any other chain in $`L`$ generates a distributive sublattice. Examples of supersolvable lattices include modular lattices, the partition lattice $`\mathrm{\Pi }_n`$ and the lattice of subgroups of a finite supersolvable group.

McNamara \[6, Theorem 1\] has recently shown that supersolvable lattices are completely characterized by $`S_n`$ EL-shellability.

###### Theorem 2.2

A finite graded lattice of rank $`n`$ is supersolvable if and only if it is $`S_n`$ EL-shellable.

### 2.3 Poset of forests

A tree is a leaf-labeled rooted binary tree and a forest is a set of such trees. Vertices are either inner vertices (valence $`3`$) or leaves and roots (valence $`1`$). By convention, edges are oriented towards the root. Leaves are bijectively labeled by a finite set. Trees and forests are pictured with their roots down and their leaves up, but are not to be considered as planar. A leaf is an ancestor of a vertex if there is a path from the leaf to the root going through the vertex. If $`F_1,F_2,\mathrm{},F_k`$ are forests on $`I_1,I_2,\mathrm{},I_k`$, let $`F_1F_2\mathrm{}F_k`$ be their disjoint union. For a forest $`F`$, we denote by $`𝒱(F)`$ the set of its inner vertices and by $`(F)`$ the set of leaves. The number of trees in a forest $`F`$ on $`I`$ is the difference between the cardinal of $`I`$ and the cardinal of $`𝒱(F)`$. By a subtree $`T_v`$ we mean the union of all paths starting from any vertex $`v`$ and going up to the leaves. Note that any subtree can be further divided in two parts denoted by $`T^L`$ and $`T^R`$ as shown in Figure 1.

Following , we introduce a partial order on the set of forests on $`I`$ denoted by $`\mathrm{For}(I)`$.

Definition Let $`F`$ and $`G`$ be forests on the label set $`I`$. Then $`FG`$ if there is a topological map from $`F`$ to $`G`$ with the following properties:

1. It is increasing with respect to orientation towards the root.
2. It maps inner vertices to inner vertices injectively.
3. It restricts to the identity of $`I`$ on leaves.
4. Its restriction to each tree of $`F`$ is injective.

In fact, such a topological map from $`F`$ to $`G`$ is determined up to isotopy by the images of the inner vertices of $`F`$. One can recover the map by joining the image of an inner vertex of $`F`$ in $`G`$ with the leaves of $`G`$ which were its ancestor leaves in $`F`$.

The following proposition can be found in \[5, Proposition 3.1\].

###### Proposition 2.3

The poset $`\mathrm{For}(I)`$ is graded by the number of inner vertices.

It was proved in  that the maximal elements of the poset $`\mathrm{For}(I)`$ are the trees. The forest without inner vertices is the unique minimal element and is denoted by $`\widehat{0}`$. For any $`JI`$, we denote by $`|_J`$ the tree such that $`𝒱(|_J)=\mathrm{}`$ and $`(|_J)=J`$. Note that $`\widehat{0}=|_I`$.

## 3 Intervals are lattices

In this section we fix a finite set of leaves $`I`$ of cardinality $`n+1`$ and consider a tree $`T`$ on $`I`$. We study the interval $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ that is a graded bounded subposet of $`\mathrm{For}(I)`$. Our main goal is to show that $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is a lattice.

Any two distinct leaves $`i,jI`$ determine an inner vertex $`v_{(i,j)}𝒱(T)`$, as the intersection of the two paths starting from these leaves and going down to the root. Sometimes we will write $`i\stackrel{v}{}j`$ instead of $`v=v_{(i,j)}`$. For any $`JI`$, let

$$𝒮(J):=\{v𝒱(T)\text{ : }v=v_{(i,j)}\text{ for some distinct }i,jJ\}.$$

###### Remark 1

For any subset $`JI`$, it is easy to see that $`|𝒮(J)|=|J|1`$.

###### Lemma 3.1

For any $`JI`$, there exists a unique tree $`T_J`$ on $`J`$ such that

$$T_J|_{IJ}T.$$

* Proof. We define $`T_J`$ to be the union of all the paths starting from the leaves in $`J`$ and going down to the root. It is easy to check that all conditions in the definition of the partial order of forests are satisfied.

###### Remark 2

Let $`J_1J_2`$ be two subsets of $`I`$. Then $`T_{J_1}|_{IJ_1}T_{J_2}|_{IJ_2}`$

The following definition is crucial in the rest of this paper.

Let $`\pi =(\pi _1,\mathrm{},\pi _k)`$ be a partition of $`I`$. We say that $`\pi `$ is $`T`$-admissible if and only if $`𝒮(\pi _i)𝒮(\pi _j)=\mathrm{}`$ for all $`ij[k]`$. We denote the set of all $`T`$-admissible partitions of $`I`$ by $`\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$.
For example, let $`T=F^{\prime \prime }`$ be the tree in Figure 3 on the set $`I=\{a,b,c,d\}`$. Then $`\{\{a,b\},\{c,d\}\}\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$, but $`\{\{a,c\},\{b,d\}\}`$ is not a $`T`$-admissible partition of $`I`$, as in fact $`𝒮(\{a,c\})=𝒮(\{b,d\})=v_{(a,c)}`$.

It is easy to see that $`\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$ is a poset by refinement order $`_r`$, i.e. $`(\pi _1,\mathrm{},\pi _n)_r(\tau _1,\mathrm{},\tau _m)`$ if and only if each block $`\pi _i`$ is contained in some block $`\tau _j`$.
For example $`\{\{a\},\{b,c\},\{d\}\}_r\{\{a\},\{b,c,d\}\}`$.

Let $`F[\widehat{0},T]`$, $`F=T_1\mathrm{}T_k`$, we define

$$\mathrm{\Pi }(F):=(\pi _1,\mathrm{},\pi _k),$$

where $`\pi _i:=(T_i)`$ for all $`i[k]`$.
Note that $`\mathrm{\Pi }(F)`$ is a $`T`$-admissible partition by condition D2.

###### Proposition 3.2

The map $`\mathrm{\Pi }:([\widehat{0},T],)(\mathrm{Ad}(T),_r)`$ is an isomorphism of posets.

* Proof. First we prove that $`\mathrm{\Pi }`$ is a bijection. For every $`\pi =(\pi _1,\mathrm{},\pi _k)\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$, let

$$\mathrm{\Gamma }(\pi ):=T_{\pi _1}\mathrm{}T_{\pi _k},$$
(2)
where each tree $`T_{\pi _i}`$ is defined by Lemma 3.1.
It is clear that $`\mathrm{\Pi }\mathrm{\Gamma }=\mathrm{Id}`$. By the uniqueness in Lemma 3.1, it follows that $`\mathrm{\Gamma }\mathrm{\Pi }=\mathrm{Id}`$, and so $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ is the inverse of $`\mathrm{\Pi }`$.
Now let $`F,G[\widehat{0},T]`$ with $`FG`$. Then, by condition D4, for all $`T_FF`$ there exists a $`T_GG`$ such that $`(T_F)(T_G)`$. It follows that $`\mathrm{\Pi }(F)_r\mathrm{\Pi }(G)`$. Conversely, if $`\pi _r\pi ^{}`$, then, by Remark 2, we have $`\mathrm{\Gamma }(\pi )\mathrm{\Gamma }(\pi ^{})`$. This concludes the proof.

From now on, forests in $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ and $`T`$-admissible partitions are identified via the bijection $`\mathrm{\Pi }`$.

We are ready to state and prove the main theorem of this section.

###### Theorem 3.3

For each tree $`T`$ on the set $`I`$, the interval $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is a lattice.

* Proof. As the interval has a $`\widehat{1}`$, by Proposition 2.1 it suffices to prove that each $`F,G[\widehat{0},T]`$ have a meet. Let $`\mathrm{\Pi }(F)=\pi =(\pi _1,\mathrm{},\pi _n)`$ and $`\mathrm{\Pi }(G)=\tau =(\tau _1,\mathrm{},\tau _m)`$. We show that the meet of $`\pi `$ and $`\tau `$ as partitions, defined by

$$\pi \tau :=(\pi _1\tau _1)(\pi _1\tau _2)\mathrm{}(\pi _n\tau _1)\mathrm{}(\pi _n\tau _m),$$

is also in $`\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$. For every $`(i,j)(i^{},j^{})[n]\times [m]`$ we have that

$$𝒮(\pi _i\tau _j)𝒮(\pi _i^{}\tau _j^{})𝒮(\pi _i)𝒮(\tau _j)𝒮(\pi _i^{})𝒮(\tau _j^{})=\mathrm{},$$

because $`\pi `$ and $`\tau `$ are in $`\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$, hence either $`𝒮(\pi _i)𝒮(\pi _i^{})`$ or $`𝒮(\tau _j)𝒮(\tau _j^{})`$ is empty. It is immediate to see that $`\pi \tau `$ is the meet also in $`\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$, hence $`\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$ is a lattice and we are done.

## 4 $`S_n`$ EL-labelings on $`[\widehat{0},T]`$

In this section we introduce an edge-labeling on the poset $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ and prove that it is an $`S_n`$ EL-labeling. By Theorem 2.2 it follows that the lattice $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is supersolvable.

A partial order $``$ is defined on the set $`𝒱(T)`$ in the following way.

Definition A vertex $`v`$ is smaller than a vertex $`v^{}`$, denoted by $`vv^{}`$, if $`v^{}`$ is on the path between the root and $`v`$. Any total order extending this partial order on $`𝒱(T)`$ is called a nice total order, still denoted by $``$.

Using a nice total order, one can label the inner vertices by integer numbers from $`1`$ to $`n`$. From now on, inner vertices and labels are identified in this way using a fixed nice total order. Note that the bottom vertex is the maximum element for the order $``$. An example is drawn in Figure 4.

Now we introduce an edge-labeling as follows. First remark that for all $`FG[\widehat{0},T]`$, one has $`𝒱(F)𝒱(G)𝒱(T)`$. Moreover if $`FG`$, by Proposition 2.3, there exists a unique $`v𝒱(G)`$ such that $`𝒱(G)=𝒱(F)\{v\}`$.

Definition Let $`FG[\widehat{0},T]`$. Then we define $`\lambda :\{(F,G):FG\}`$ by

$$𝒱(G)=𝒱(F)\{\lambda (F,G)\},$$

where $`\lambda (F,G)`$ is the label of $`v`$.

An example of this edge-labeling is shown in Figure 5. The proof of the following lemma is immediate.

###### Lemma 4.1

The label of a maximal chain of $`[F,G]`$ is a permutation of the set $`𝒱(G)𝒱(F)`$.

###### Lemma 4.2

For each $`F[\widehat{0},T]\{T\}`$, there exists a unique $`G[\widehat{0},T]`$ covering $`F`$ such that

$$\lambda (F,G)=\mathrm{min}(𝒱(T)𝒱(F)).$$

* Proof. Let $`\mathrm{\Pi }(F)=\pi `$ and let $`v_0:=\mathrm{min}(𝒱(T)𝒱(F))`$. Consider the two subtrees starting from $`v_0`$, as explained in §2.3, denoted $`T_{v_0}^L`$ and $`T_{v_0}^R`$. We show that $`(T_{v_0}^R)`$ is contained in one part of $`\pi `$.
Each $`w𝒱(T_{v_0}^R)`$ is such that $`wv_0`$. It follows that $`w𝒱(F)`$ by minimality of $`v_0`$. Let $`ij(T_{v_0}^R)`$, then there is $`v𝒱(T_{v_0}^R)𝒱(F)`$ such that $`i\stackrel{v}{}j`$. Hence $`i,j`$ are in the same part of $`\pi `$. Therefore $`(T_{v_0}^R)`$ is contained in only one part of $`\pi `$ denoted by $`\pi _R`$. The same result is true for $`T_{v_0}^L`$, and we denote the corresponding part by $`\pi _L`$. As $`v_0𝒱(F)`$, the parts $`\pi _L`$ and $`\pi _R`$ are distinct. We define a new partition

$$\pi ^{}:=(\pi _L\pi _R,\pi _1,\mathrm{},\pi _k),$$

where $`\pi _j`$ are the remaining parts of $`\pi `$. From now on, we denote $`\pi _L\pi _R`$ by $`\pi _{LR}`$.
To show that $`\pi ^{}\mathrm{Ad}(T)`$, it suffices to prove that

$$𝒮(\pi _{LR})𝒮(\pi _j)=\mathrm{},\mathrm{for}\mathrm{all}j[k].$$
(3)
We have that $`𝒮(\pi _{LR})𝒮(\pi _L)𝒮(\pi _R)\{v_0\}`$. On the other hand, by Remark 1, we have that $`|𝒮(\pi _L)|+|𝒮(\pi _R)|+1=|𝒮(\pi _{LR})|`$, and so we have an equality.
Now, for any $`j[k]`$, the vertex $`v_0`$ is not in $`𝒮(\pi _j)`$, because all the ancestors of $`v_0`$ are in $`\pi _L`$ or in $`\pi _R`$. Hence condition $`(\text{3})`$ is verified and the proof of theorem follows by defining $`G:=\mathrm{\Gamma }(\pi _{LR},\pi _1,\mathrm{},\pi _k)`$, where $`\mathrm{\Gamma }`$ is defined in (2).

The preceding lemma can be extended as follows.

###### Proposition 4.3

For each $`F,H[\widehat{0},T]`$, $`F<H`$ there exists a unique $`G[\widehat{0},T]`$ covering $`F`$ such that

$$\lambda (F,G)=\mathrm{min}(𝒱(H)𝒱(F)).$$

* Proof. If $`H=T`$ then the result is given by Lemma 4.2. Otherwise let $`H=H_1H_2\mathrm{}H_k`$, where $`H_j`$ is a tree for all $`j[k]`$. Since $`FH`$, we have $`F=F_1F_2\mathrm{}F_k`$ where $`F_j`$ is a forest, for all $`j[k]`$. It was observed in \[5, Proposition 2.1\] that the interval $`[F,H]`$ is isomorphic to $`_{j=1}^k[F_j,H_j]`$. Let $`v_1:=\mathrm{min}(𝒱(H)𝒱(F))`$. We have $`𝒱(H)=𝒱(H_1)𝒱(H_2)\mathrm{}𝒱(H_k)`$ and, after re-ordering, we can assume that $`v_1𝒱(H_1)`$. Then, by Lemma 4.2 applied to $`[F_1,H_1]`$, there exists a unique $`G_1[F_1,H_1]`$ covering $`F_1`$ such that $`\lambda (F_1,G_1)=v_1`$. Define $`G=G_1F_2\mathrm{}F_k`$ in $`[F,H]`$. Then $`G`$ is the unique forest of $`[F,H]`$, covering $`F`$, such that $`\lambda (F,G)=v_1`$. This concludes the proof.

###### Theorem 4.4

The lattice $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is EL-shellable.

* Proof. By Lemma 4.1, for any interval $`[F,G]`$ of $`[\widehat{0},T]`$, the unique possible increasing label for a saturated chain from $`F`$ to $`G`$ is given by the unique increasing permutation of the elements of $`𝒱(G)𝒱(F)`$.
Then Proposition 4.3 implies that there exists an unique chain $`m`$ from $`F`$ to $`G`$ with this label. The other maximal chains of $`[F,G]`$ are labeled by different permutations, which are lexicographically greater than the increasing one.
Hence the edge-labeling $`\lambda `$ is an EL-labeling.

###### Corollary 4.5

The lattice $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is supersolvable.

* Proof. By Theorem 4.4, $`\lambda `$ is an EL-labeling and by Lemma 4.1, $`\lambda (m)`$ is a permutation of $`[n]`$ for each maximal chain $`m`$. Hence $`\lambda `$ is an $`S_n`$ EL-labeling and the result follows from Theorem 2.2.

###### Remark 3

Note that $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is not semimodular in general. For example, the atoms $`\{\{j,k\},\{i\},\{l\}\}`$ and $`\{\{i,l\},\{j\},\{k\}\}`$ in Figure 5 do not satisfy the condition (1).

## 5 Characteristic polynomials

In this section, we recover the results of  concerning the characteristic polynomials of the intervals $`[\widehat{0},T]`$. Note that, by Remark 3, the well-known theorem of Stanley \[8, Theorem 4.1\] (see also \[7, Theorem 6.2\]) on the factorization of the characteristic polynomials of semimodular supersolvable lattices, does not apply. We use instead a stronger theorem due to Blass and Sagan .

### 5.1 LL-lattices

Recall that the characteristic polynomial of a graded finite lattice $`L`$ of rank $`n`$ is

$$\chi _L(t)=\underset{yL}{}\mu (\widehat{0},y)t^{n\mathrm{rk}(y)},$$

where $`\mu `$ is the Möbius function of $`L`$ and $`\mathrm{rk}(y)`$ is the rank of $`y`$.

Following , we define an element $`x`$ of a lattice $`L`$ to be left-modular if, for all $`yz`$,

$$y(xz)=(yx)z.$$

A maximal chain $`m(L)`$ is said to be left-modular if all its elements are left-modular.

###### Remark 4

From \[8, Proposition 2.2\], it follows that if $`L`$ is a supersolvable lattice then its $`M`$-chain is left-modular.

Any maximal chain $`m:\widehat{0}=x_0x_1\mathrm{}x_n=\widehat{1}`$ defines a partition of the set of atoms A into subsets called levels indexed by $`i[n]`$:

$$\text{A}_i=\{a\text{A}\text{ : }ax_i\text{ and }ax_{i1}\}.$$

The partial order $`_m`$ on A induced by the maximal chain $`m`$ is defined by

$$a_mb\mathrm{if}\mathrm{and}\mathrm{only}\mathrm{if}a\text{A}_i\mathrm{and}b\text{A}_j\mathrm{with}i<j.$$

This partial order should not be confused with the covering relation.

Then the following is called the level condition with respect to $`m`$:

$$\mathrm{if}a_0_ma_1_ma_2_m\mathrm{}_ma_k,\mathrm{then}a_0\underset{i=1}{\overset{k}{}}a_i.$$

A lattice $`L`$ having a maximal chain $`m`$ that is left-modular and satisfies the level condition is called an LL-lattice.

The following theorem is due to Blass and Sagan \[3, Theorem 6.5\].

###### Theorem 5.1

Let $`P`$ be an LL-lattice of rank $`n`$. Let $`\text{A}_i`$ be the levels with respect to the left-modular chain of $`P`$. Then

$$\chi _P(t)=\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}(t|\text{A}_i|).$$

### 5.2 Factorization of characteristic polynomials

A tree $`T`$ with $`n`$ inner vertices and leaf set $`I`$ is fixed. A nice total order on $`𝒱(T)`$ is chosen, defining an edge-labeling as in §4.

The set A of atoms of $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is the set of pairs $`(i,j)`$ of distinct elements of $`I`$. To each atom $`(i,j)`$ is associated an inner vertex $`v_{(i,j)}`$ of $`T`$ as defined in §3. The covering edge $`\widehat{0}(i,j)`$ is labeled by the integer in $`[n]`$ corresponding to $`v_{(i,j)}`$ in the chosen total order on $`𝒱(T)`$.

###### Proposition 5.2

Let $`a_1,a_2,\mathrm{},a_k\text{A}`$ with pairwise distinct vertices $`v_1,v_2,\mathrm{},v_k`$ in $`𝒱(T)`$. Then $`𝒱(a_1a_2\mathrm{}a_k)=\{v_1,v_2,\mathrm{},v_k\}`$.

* Proof. Let $`V=\{v_1,v_2,\mathrm{},v_k\}`$. Let $`\pi ^{(1)},\pi ^{(2)},\mathrm{},\pi ^{(k)}`$ be the partitions of $`I`$ associated to $`a_1,a_2,\mathrm{},a_k`$. Let $`\pi `$ be the join $`\pi ^{(1)}\pi ^{(2)}\mathrm{}\pi ^{(k)}`$ in the lattice of partitions. We want to show that $`\pi \mathrm{Ad}(T)`$ and that $`𝒱(\pi )=V`$.
Let $`p`$ be a part of $`\pi `$. Let $`V_p`$ be the set of vertices in $`V`$ whose corresponding atoms in $`\{a_1,\mathrm{},a_k\}`$ have their leaves in $`p`$. Observe that the sets $`V_p`$ form a partition of $`V`$ because atoms in $`\{a_1,\mathrm{},a_k\}`$ have pairwise distinct vertices. Let $`v`$ be a vertex in $`𝒮(p)`$. This means that there exists $`i,j`$ in $`p`$ such that $`i\stackrel{v}{}j`$. As $`p`$ is a part of a join, there exists a chain

$$i=i_0\stackrel{t_0}{}i_1\stackrel{t_1}{}i_2\mathrm{}i_\mathrm{}1\stackrel{t_\mathrm{}1}{}i_{\mathrm{}}\stackrel{t_{\mathrm{}}}{}i_{\mathrm{}+1}=j,$$

where each $`i_r\stackrel{t_r}{}i_{r+1}`$ is an atom in $`\{a_1,\mathrm{},a_k\}`$ with vertex in $`V_p`$.
In the rest of the proof, the symbol $``$ stands for the partial order introduced in §4.
Let us prove by induction on the length $`\mathrm{}`$ of the chain that there exists $`\theta _{\mathrm{}}`$ in $`V_p`$ such that $`\theta _{\mathrm{}}t_0`$ and $`\theta _{\mathrm{}}t_{\mathrm{}}`$.
If $`\mathrm{}=0`$, then one can take $`\theta _0=t_0`$. Assume that there exists $`\theta _\mathrm{}1`$ in $`V_p`$ such that $`\theta _\mathrm{}1t_0`$ and $`\theta _\mathrm{}1t_\mathrm{}1`$. The path joining the leaf $`i_{\mathrm{}}`$ to the root contains the vertices $`t_\mathrm{}1`$,$`t_{\mathrm{}}`$ and hence also by induction hypothesis the vertex $`\theta _\mathrm{}1`$. Either $`t_{\mathrm{}}\theta _\mathrm{}1`$, and one can take $`\theta _{\mathrm{}}=\theta _\mathrm{}1`$ or $`t_{\mathrm{}}\theta _\mathrm{}1`$ and one can take $`\theta _{\mathrm{}}=t_{\mathrm{}}`$. This concludes the induction.
Therefore $`\theta _{\mathrm{}}V_p`$ is such that $`i\stackrel{\theta _{\mathrm{}}}{}j`$. Hence $`\theta _{\mathrm{}}=vV_p`$ and so $`𝒮(p)V_p`$. The converse inclusion is clear.
Now let $`p`$ and $`p^{}`$ be two different parts of $`\pi `$. Then $`𝒮(p)𝒮(p^{})=V_pV_p^{}`$ is empty. Hence $`\pi `$ is $`T`$-admissible.
We have proved that $`\pi `$ is $`T`$-admissible and that the vertices of $`\pi `$ are exactly $`V`$. It follows that $`\pi `$ defines the join $`a_1\mathrm{}a_k`$ in $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ and the proposition is proved.

Define another partition of A indexed by $`i[n]`$:

$$\text{B}_i=\{a\text{A}\text{ : }\lambda (\widehat{0},a)=i\}.$$

Let $`m:\widehat{0}=x_0x_1\mathrm{}x_n=T`$ be the fixed modular chain of $`[\widehat{0},T]`$, i.e. the unique increasing maximal chain for the fixed labeling.

###### Lemma 5.3

Let $`i[n]`$. For each $`j[i]`$, let $`a_j`$ be an atom in $`\text{B}_j`$. Then

$$x_i=a_1a_2\mathrm{}a_i.$$

* Proof. The proof is by induction on $`i`$. By Proposition 4.3, $`x_1=a_1`$ is the unique atom in $`\text{B}_1`$. Assume that $`x_{i1}=a_1\mathrm{}a_{i1}`$. Then $`a_1\mathrm{}a_{i1}a_i`$ is $`x_{i1}a_i`$ and has rank $`i`$ by Proposition 5.2. Moreover we have that $`\lambda (x_{i1},x_{i1}a_i)=i`$. By uniqueness in Proposition 4.3, it follows that $`x_i=x_{i1}a_i`$.

###### Lemma 5.4

Let $`\text{A}_i`$ be the levels with respect to $`m`$. Then for each $`i[n]`$,

$$\text{A}_i=\text{B}_i.$$

* Proof. It suffices to prove that

$$\{a\text{A}\text{ : }ax_i\}=\{a\text{A}\text{ : }\lambda (\widehat{0},a)[i]\}.$$

If $`ax_i`$, then $`\lambda (\widehat{0},a)`$ is one of the vertices of $`x_i`$, i.e. belongs to $`[i]`$. Conversely, take any atom $`a`$ with $`\lambda (\widehat{0},a)`$ in $`[i]`$. Choose other atoms to have one atom in each $`\text{B}_j`$ for $`j[i]`$. Then, by Lemma 5.3, $`x_i`$ is the join of $`a`$ and the other chosen atoms, so $`ax_i`$.

###### Proposition 5.5

The lattice $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is an LL-lattice.

* Proof. This lattice is supersolvable, so by Remark 4 the $`M`$-chain is a left-modular chain. It remains to check the level condition. Take atoms $`a_0,a_1,\mathrm{},a_k`$ which belongs to pairwise different $`\text{A}_i`$. By Lemma 5.4, these atoms belong to pairwise different $`\text{B}_i`$. Then by Proposition 5.2 the set of vertices of the join $`a_1\mathrm{}a_k`$ does not contain the vertex of the atom $`a_0`$. This ensures the level condition.

Now we are ready to state and prove the main result of this section, which was already proved in \[5, Theorem 4.6\].

###### Theorem 5.6

The characteristic polynomial of $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ is

$$\chi _{[\widehat{0},T]}(t)=\underset{v𝒱(T)}{}(te(v)),$$

where $`e(v)`$ is the product of the number of left ancestor leaves of $`v`$ by the number of right ancestor leaves of $`v`$.

* Proof. By Proposition 5.5, one can apply Theorem 5.1 to $`[\widehat{0},T]`$. Let us count the number of elements of $`\text{A}_i`$ for each $`i`$. By Lemma 5.4, this is equal to the cardinality of $`\text{B}_i`$. Let $`v`$ be the vertex of $`T`$ with index $`i`$. It is easy to see that the number of atoms in $`\text{B}_i`$ is the number of left ancestor leaves of $`v`$ times the number of right ancestor leaves of $`v`$.

For example, the characteristic polynomial of the interval $`[\widehat{0},T]`$ where $`T`$ is the tree in Figure 6 is $`\chi _{[\widehat{0},T]}(t)=(t1)^3(t4)^2(t10)`$.