English

Spectra of infinite graphs via freeness with amalgamation

Combinatorics 2022-05-18 v5 Operator Algebras Probability

Abstract

We use tools from free probability to study the spectra of Hermitian operators on infinite graphs. Special attention is devoted to universal covering trees of finite graphs. For operators on these graphs we derive a new variational formula for the spectral radius and provide new proofs of results due to Sunada and Aomoto using free probability. With the goal of extending the applicability of free probability techniques beyond universal covering trees, we introduce a new combinatorial product operation on graphs and show that, in the non-commutative probability context, it corresponds to the notion of freeness with amalgamation. We show that Cayley graphs of amalgamated free products of groups, as well as universal covering trees, can be constructed using our graph product.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1912.10137,
  title  = {Spectra of infinite graphs via freeness with amalgamation},
  author = {Jorge Garza-Vargas and Archit Kulkarni},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1912.10137},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

v2: Key references and new results added. Important bibliographic note (before Sec 1.1) has been added; v3: added discussions, generalized Thm 1.6 from adjacency matrices to graph Jacobi matrices; v5: small update on the definition of the graph product, strengthening of main theorem of Section 5, clarifications added, explanations expanded, figures updated, minor errors fixed