ICECA 2026 (August 17-19, 2026), an interview with Christian Krattenthaler, and Condorcet revisited.
Article excerpt
Toufic Mansour, Christian Krattenthaler, and Condorcet. International Conference on Enumerative Combinatorics and Applications (ICECA 2026) The fifth International Conference on Enumerative Combinatorics and Applications will take place online on August 17-19, 2026. Invited speakers include George E. Andrews, Sara Billey, … Continue reading →
Toufic Mansour, Christian Krattenthaler, and Condorcet.
International Conference on Enumerative Combinatorics and Applications (ICECA 2026)
The fifth International Conference on Enumerative Combinatorics and Applications will take place online on August 17-19, 2026. Invited speakers include George E. Andrews, Sara Billey, Joel Friedman, Christian Krattenthaler, Richard Stanley, Guoce Xin, Sherry H.F. Yan, and Raphael Yuster. The conference homepage includes links to abstracts and videos from the first four conferences.
The conference series is organized by Toufic Mansour, who also founded the journal Enumerative Combinatorics and Applications (ECA) and initiated its interview series and open-problems page.
An interview with Christian Krattenthaler.
The most recent interview on ECA is with Christian Krattenthaler whom I have known for many decades. The interview touches on many areas of enunerative combinatorics, with a special emphasis on determinants. Christian mentioned early connections between combinatorics and determinants in the works of George Andrews, Richard Stanley, Bernd Lindström, John Stembridge and others.
Among his contributions he highlights his bijective proof (not using the involution principle) of Stanley’s hook-content formula; a joint paper with Maria Prohaska proving a remarkable determinantal formula conjectured by Also Conca and Jürgen Herzog; and some new formulas for ! (joint work with Gert Almkvist and Joakim Petersson). Mansour’s introduction highlights Christian’s 2005 paper Advanced determinant calculus that “has become a central reference in the field, shaping a generation of research.”
Beyond mathematics, Christian is also a trained concert pianist, maintaining a lifelong passion for music alongside his research career. In part of the interview he describes his views on music. In this context, one may also mention his essay Music AND Mathematics? Personal views on a difficult relationship.
Rebecca Embar and Doron Zeilberger revisit Condorcet’s paradox
Among the papers I saw on ECA there was one by Rebecca Embar and Doron Zeilberger, Counting Condorcet. The paper enumerates the precise number of profiles for individual order relations on three alternatives that lead to Condorcet’s paradox (among the possible profiles).
Condorcet has been mentioned several times on this blog. In a 2012 post, we discussed his prominent role among the philosophers who contributed to the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. In a 2009 post we highlighted his role in social choice theory.
Update: 10th International Conference on Lattice Path Combinatorics and Applications 2026 (LPC 2026)
The 10th International Conference on Lattice Path Combinatorics and Applications, will take place at TU Wien in Vienna, Austria, July 20, 24, 2026. The conference will cover interactions of lattice paths with various domains (probability theory, enumerative/algebraic/asymptotic combinatorics, q-analogues, computer science, combinatorial physics, …)