Let $f$ be a homogeneous polynomial and $I$ be the principal ideal generated by $f$.
- What are possible reduced Groebner bases of $I$? Describe all initial ideals of $f$.
- Show that the Groebner fan of $I$ coincides with the normal fan of $f$.
- Show that $\mathcal{T}(I) = \mathcal{T}(f)$.
- Describe the Groebner fan and the tropical variety of $\langle x^3 + y^3 + z^3 + xyz\rangle$. (What are the facets? dimension? lineality?)
Solution:
1) The only reduced Gröbner basis of $I$ is the set $\{f\}$ because every element of $I$ is a multiple of $f$ and the initial form of a product is the product of the initial forms (with respect to any term order). Therefore, the set of initial ideals is in one-to-one correspondence to the faces of the Newton polytope of $f$: The initial ideals are generated by the initial forms of $f$ with respect to the weight order under consideration. The initial form is defined as
(1)where $a$ ranges over $\{a\in\operatorname{supp}(f)\colon \forall\; b\in\operatorname{supp}(f)\; \omega\cdot a \geq \omega\cdot b\}$. This set is by definition a face of $\operatorname{New}(f)$. The vertices of $\operatorname{New}(f)$ correspond to the monomial ideals.
2) The Gröbner fan of $I$ is the set of all weight vectors such that the initial ideal with respect to the corresponding weight order does not contain a monomial. Since the initial ideal is also principal, this is the same as saying, that it is not a monomial ideal. Therefore, the weights in question correspond to linear forms exposing a face of $\operatorname{New}(f)$ that is not a vertex. This gives the correspondence between the Gröbner fan of $I$ and the cones in the normal fan of $\operatorname{New}(f)$ that are not full-dimensional (i.e. the normal cones to faces that are not vertices).
3) This follows form the fact that a principal ideal contains a monomial if and only if it is a monomial ideal. (Recall that the tropical variety of an ideal is defined as the set of all weight vectors $\omega\in\mathbb{R}^n$ such that $\operatorname{in}_\omega(I)$ contains no monomial and the tropical hypersurface of $f$ is defined as all weight vectors such that $\operatorname{in}_\omega(f)$ is not a monomial).
4) The Newton polytope of the given polynomial is a scalar multiple of the two-dimensional simplex in $\mathbb{R}^3$, namely
(2)It looks like a triangle in the affine plane defined by the equation $x_1+x_2+x_3=1$. Therefore the normal fan of this polytope contains a linear space, namely the line spanned by $(1,1,1)$.