Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2014/iii/paper-2/3/solution

Use Dynkin labels for the highest weight of the complex special linear Lie algebra . The A2 root system has and in these coordinates. In the drawings, and have equal lengths and angle ; a label at a point records its weight multiplicity, not a further copy at a different position.
The defining fundamental representation has the three weights
For , lower from its highest weight by the simple roots, retaining multiplicities. One convenient way to calculate them is the sl3 interlacing character formula: for shape the integer patterns satisfy , , , and contribute the weight
Enumerating these patterns gives the weight diagram
Its dimension is . The diagram below draws all twelve distinct positions, with the three inner multiplicities equal to two. The extra panel gives the symmetric square used in the calculation.
Figure 1.
A2 weight diagrams for Gamma(2,1), the defining Gamma(1,0), and its symmetric square, with every weight multiplicity
.
The six symmetric monomials in the defining basis give , with weights
each occurring once. Thus the tensor product has dimension
In a tensor product of Lie algebra representations, weights add and their multiplicities multiply. In terms of formal characters, . Consequently , summing over the six weights just listed. To show the indicated dominant multiplicities explicitly, the contributions in that order are
The tensor-product weight diagram below includes every position, and highlights these dominant weights. It also records the zero-weight multiplicity nine; that multiplicity is not a count of trivial summands.
Figure 2.
All weights of the ninety-dimensional sl3 tensor product Gamma(2,1) tensor Sym2 Gamma(1,0), with dominant weights highlighted and multiplicities labelled
.
Apply the Weyl complete reducibility theorem and subtract irreducible formal characters in decreasing dominance order. The multiplicities at these five dominant positions in the potential summands are
These entries can be obtained by the same interlacing enumeration or by weight strings. Starting with , subtracting leaves ; subtracting leaves ; then the two ten-dimensional modules leave a single copy of the dominant weight . This is highest-weight character subtraction. Therefore
Every summand occurs once. The Weyl dimension formula gives , exhausting the dimension of and ruling out further irreducible summands. Computing the complete formal character also leaves no residual weight multiplicities.

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