Let W be an extended affine Weyl group. We prove that the minimal length elements W of any conjugacy class W of W satisfy some nice properties, generalizing results of Geck and Pfeiffer [<i>On the irreducible characters of Hecke algebras</i>, Adv. Math. <b>102</b> (1993), 7994] on finite Weyl groups. We also study a special class of conjugacy classes, the straight conjugacy classes. These conjugacy classes are in a natural bijection with the Frobenius-twisted conjugacy classes of some W -adic group and satisfy additional interesting properties. Furthermore, we discuss some applications to the affine Hecke algebra W

Let k be a commutative Noetherian ring and C−− be a locally finite k-linear category equipped with a self-embedding functor of degree 1. We show under a moderate condition that finitely generated torsion representations of C−− are super finitely presented (that is, they have projective resolutions each term of which is finitely generated). In the situation that these self-embedding functors are genetic functors, we give upper bounds for homological degrees of finitely generated torsion modules. These results apply to quite a few categories recently appearing in representation stability theory. In particular, when k is a field of characteristic 0, we obtain another upper bound for homological degrees of finitely generated FI-modules.

We find sufficient conditions for the construction of vertex algebraic intertwining operators, among generalized Verma modules for an affine Lie algebra g^, from g-module homomorphisms. When g=sl_2, these results extend previous joint work with J. Yang, but the method used here is different. Here, we construct intertwining operators by solving Knizhnik-Zamolodchikov equations for three-point correlation functions associated to g^, and we identify obstructions to the construction arising from the possible non-existence of series solutions having a prescribed form.

In this paper we describe an inductive machinery to investigate asymptotic behaviors of homology groups and related invariants of representations of certain graded combinatorial categories over a commutative Noetherian ring k, via introducing inductive functors which generalize important properties of shift functors of FI-modules. In particular, a sufficient criterion for finiteness of Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity of finitely generated representations of these categories is obtained. As applications, we show that a few important infinite combinatorial categories appearing in representation stability theory are equipped with inductive functors, and hence the finiteness of Castelnuovo-Mumford regularity of their finitely generated representations is guaranteed. We also prove that truncated representations of these categories have linear minimal resolutions by relative projective modules, which are precisely linear minimal projective resolutions when k is a field of characteristic 0.

In this paper we study derived equivalences between triangular matrix algebras using certain classical recollements. We show that special properties of these recollements actually characterize triangular matrix algebras, and describe methods to construct tilting modules and tilting complexes inducing derived equivalences between them.