Families
Generalized Narayana polynomials
For $m, n \geq 0$, the generalized Narayana polynomial is
$$N_{n,m}(x) = \sum_{k=0}^{n} \frac{\binom{n}{k}\binom{n+m}{k}}{\binom{m+k}{k}}\, x^k.$$
For $m = 1$ the coefficients are Narayana numbers; for example $N_{2,1}(x) = 1 + 3x + x^2$. These polynomials are Pólya-frequency, and the Narayana transform $x^n \mapsto N_{n,m}(x)$ preserves Pólya-frequency polynomials.
References
The coefficient normalization is from Jianxi Mao and Lijie Wang, “The Narayana transformation,” arXiv:2607.01572 (2026), Eq. (1.2). The root-location input is D. Dominici, S. J. Johnston, and K. Jordaan, “Real zeros of 2F1 hypergeometric polynomials,” Journal of Computational and Applied Mathematics 247 (2013), 152–161, which is Lemma 2.5 in Mao–Wang. See also the Narayana real-rootedness examples on symmetricfunctions.com.
≔ Definitions
Generalized Narayana polynomials
def narayanaPolynomial (m n : ℕ) : ℝ[X] :=
∑ k ∈ Finset.range (n + 1), C (narayanaTransformCoeff m n k) * X ^ k
Narayana transform
def narayanaTransform (m : ℕ) : ℝ[X] → ℝ[X] :=
basisTransform (narayanaPolynomial m)
⊢ Theorems
Generalized Narayana polynomials are real-rootedMain result
theorem splits_narayanaPolynomial (m n : ℕ) :
(narayanaPolynomial m n).Splits
Generalized Narayana polynomials are Pólya-frequency
theorem narayanaPolynomialRootLocation :
narayanaPolynomialRootLocationStatement
The Narayana transform preserves Pólya-frequency polynomialsMain result
theorem narayanaTransformPreservesPF :
narayanaTransformPreservesPFStatement
Lean source RealRooted/Challenges/Narayana.lean at revision 5827550b.