New cluster algebras from old: integrability beyond Zamolodchikov periodicity

We consider discrete dynamical systems obtained as deformations of mutations in cluster algebras associated with finite-dimensional simple Lie algebras. The original (undeformed) dynamical systems provide the simplest examples of Zamolodchikov periodicity: they are affine birational maps for which every orbit is periodic with the same period. Following on from preliminary work by one of us with Kouloukas, here we present integrable maps obtained from deformations of cluster mutations related to the simple root systems A3, C2, B3 and D4. We further show how new cluster algebras arise, by considering Laurentification, that is, a lifting to a higher-dimensional map expressed in a set of new variables (tau functions), for which the dynamics exhibits the Laurent property. For the integrable map obtained by deformation of type A3, which already appeared in our previous work, we show that there is a commuting map of Quispel–Roberts–Thompson (QRT) type which is built from a composition of mutations and a permutation applied to the same cluster algebra of rank 6, with an additional 2 frozen variables. Furthermore, both the deformed A3 map and the QRT map correspond to translation by a generator in the Mordell-Weil group of a rational elliptic surface of rank two, and the underlying cluster algebra comes from a quiver that is mutation equivalent to the q-Painlevé III quiver found by Okubo. The deformed integrable maps of types C2, B3 and D4 are also related to elliptic surfaces. From a dynamical systems viewpoint, the message of the paper is that special families of birational maps with completely periodic dynamics under iteration admit natural deformations that are aperiodic yet completely integrable.