A hyper-geometric approach to the BMV-conjecture (Q2581033)

Let \(d\geq 1\) be fixed, and let \(A, B\) be complex, hermitian \(d \times d\) matrices and \(B \geq 0,\) then let \[ \Phi^{A, B}(z):= \text{tr}(\exp(A-z \cdot B)) \] for \(z\in \mathbb{C}\). The Bessis-Moussa-Villani conjecture [open since 1975, see \textit{D. Bessis, P. Moussa} and \textit{M. Villani}, J. Math. Phys. 16, 2318--2325 (1975; Zbl 0976.82501)], asserts that the function \(\Phi^{A,B}\) is completely monotonic, i.e. \(\Phi^{A,B}\) is the Laplace transform of a positive measure \(\mu^{A,B}\) supported in \([0,\infty]\), \[ \text{tr}(\exp(A-z \cdot B))=\int^\infty_0 \exp(-zx)\,d\mu^{A,B}(x). \] In this paper the positivity of the BMV measure is proved by combinatorial methods for dimension \(d = 3\) in several non-trivial cases. Furthermore, a counter-example for the original version of the BMV conjecture is given.