Positivity and periodicity of $Q$-systems in the WZW fusion ring

Abstract

We study properties of solutions of $Q$-systems in the WZW fusion ring obtained by the Kirillov-Reshetikhin modules. We make a conjecture about their positivity and periodicity and give a proof of it in some cases. We also construct a positive solution of the level $k$ restricted $Q$-system of classical types in the fusion rings. As an application, we prove some conjectures of Kirillov and Kuniba-Nakanishi-Suzuki on the level $k$ restricted $Q$-systems.