Multiplicities Associated to Graded Families of Ideals

Abstract

We prove that limits of multiplicities associated to graded families of ideals exist under very general conditions. Most of our results hold for analytically unramified equicharacteristic local rings, with perfect residue fields. We give a number of applications, including a "volume = multiplicity" formula, generalizing the formula of Lazarsfeld and Mustata, and a proof that the epsilon multiplicity of Ulrich and Validashti exists as a limit for ideals in rather general rings, including analytic local domains. We also prove an asymptotic "additivity formula" for limits of multiplicities, and a formula on limiting growth of valuations, which answers a question posed by the author, Kia Dalili and Olga Kashcheyeva. Our proofs are inspired by a philosophy of Okounkov, for computing limits of multiplicities as the volume of a slice of an appropriate cone generated by a semigroup determined by an appropriate filtration on a family of algebraic objects.