Combinatorics of the Fourier transform: Stokes data, Gale duality and frieze patterns

Abstract

We study the action of the Fourier transform on the Stokes data of irregular connections on the complex affine line with symmetric irregular classes at infinity, both from the point of view of Stokes filtered local systems and of Stokes local systems, and we show that it is governed by a rich combinatorial structure: (1) Observing that, in this setup, a Stokes filtration is fully determined by the data of either its recessive or subdominant solution spaces, and making the link with results of T. Mochizuki, we show that the Fourier transform amounts to exchanging recessive and subdominant solutions via the Gale transform of configurations of points in projective spaces. (2) We show that the equivalence between recessive solutions and Stokes local systems is deeply connected with the triality relating point configurations, superperiodic linear difference equations and frieze patterns obtained by Morier-Genoud-Ovsienko-Schwartz-Tabachnikov: Up to signs, the coefficients of the difference equations and friezes coincide with the nontrivial Stokes matrix entries. It follows from this Stokes-frieze correspondence that the Fourier transform of Stokes representations is given by their combinatorial Gale transform, leading to explicit closed formulas.