English

Asymptotics of the Longest Increasing Subsequence in Random Permutations

History and Overview 2025-11-04 v1 Combinatorics

Abstract

In this paper, we examine the asymptotic behavior of the longest increasing subsequence (LIS) in a uniformly random permutation of nn elements. We rely on the Robinson--Schensted--Knuth correspondence, Young tableaux, and key classical results -- including the Erd\H{o}s--Szekeres theorem and the Hook Length Formula -- to demonstrate that the expected LIS length grows as 2n2\sqrt{n}. We review the essential variational principles of Logan--Shepp and Vershik--Kerov, which determine the limiting shape of the associated random Young diagrams, and summarize the Baik--Deift--Johansson theorem that links fluctuations of the LIS length to the Tracy--Widom distribution. Our approach focuses on providing conceptual and intuitive explanations of these results, unifying classical proofs into a single narrative and supplying fresh visual examples, while referring the reader to the original literature for detailed proofs and rigorous arguments.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2511.00009,
  title  = {Asymptotics of the Longest Increasing Subsequence in Random Permutations},
  author = {Mihir Gupta},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2511.00009},
  year   = {2025}
}
R2 v1 2026-07-01T07:16:03.625Z