English

Hyperpfaffians and Geometric Complexity Theory

Computational Complexity 2020-02-26 v2 Rings and Algebras Representation Theory

Abstract

The hyperpfaffian polynomial was introduced by Barvinok in 1995 as a natural generalization of the well-known Pfaffian polynomial to higher order tensors. We prove that the hyperpfaffian is the unique smallest degree SL-invariant on the space of higher order tensors. We then study the hyperpfaffian's computational complexity and prove that it is VNP-complete. This disproves a conjecture of Mulmuley in geometric complexity theory about the computational complexity of invariant rings.

Cite

@article{arxiv.1912.09389,
  title  = {Hyperpfaffians and Geometric Complexity Theory},
  author = {Christian Ikenmeyer and Michael Walter},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1912.09389},
  year   = {2020}
}

Comments

4 pages; results merged into arXiv:1910.01251

R2 v1 2026-06-23T12:51:27.599Z