Chip Firing on Directed $k$-ary Trees

Abstract

Chip-firing is a combinatorial game played on a graph in which we place and disperse chips on vertices until a stable state is reached. We study a chip-firing variant played on an infinite rooted directed $k$-ary tree, where we place $k^{\ell }$ chips on the root for some positive integer $\ell$, and we say a vertex $v$ can fire if it has at least $k$ chips. A vertex fires by dispersing one chip to each out-neighbor. Once every vertex has less than $k$ chips, we reach a stable configuration since no vertex can fire. We determine the exact number and properties of the possible stable configurations of chips in the setting where chips are distinguishable.

arXiv comment21 pages, 6 Figures