Sign changes in statistics for plane partitions

Abstract

Recent work of Cesana, Craig and the third author shows that the trace of plane partitions is asymptotically equidistributed in residue classes mod $b$. Applying a technique of the first two authors and Garnowski, we prove asymptotic formulas for the secondary terms in this equidistribution, which are controlled by certain complex numbers generated by a twisted MacMahon-type product. We further carry out a similar analysis for a statistic related to plane overpartitions.