On the digraphs of sign solvable linear systems (Q1579516)

This paper belongs to qualitative matrix theory, that is, the study of properties of matrices which depend only on the signs (0,1,-1) of entries and not on their magnitudes. The qualitative class \(Q(A)\) of a matrix \(A\) is the set of matrices with the same sign pattern as \(A\). A linear system \(Ax=b\) of equations which is solvable for \(x\), is said to be sign-solvable if \(Q(x)\) is completely determined by \(Q(A)\) and \(Q(b)\). The signed digraph associated with a square matrix \(A\) is the digraph whose vertices correspond to rows (columns) of \(A\) and arcs correspond to the non-zero entries of \(A\). Arcs are labelled with the sign of the corresponding entry. The purpose of this paper is to characterise the signed digraphs of the matrices which represent sign-solvable linear systems. The characterisation involves a class of forbidden sub-digraphs.