The WST-decomposition for partial matrices (Q1715837)

A matrix over \(\mathbb{F} [x_1, \dots, x_k]\), where \(\mathbb{F}\) is a field, is an affine column independent matrix or ACI-matrix if its entries are polynomials of degree at most one and no indeterminate appears in two different columns. A completion of an ACI-matrix is a constant matrix over \(\mathbb{F}\) obtained by assigning values from \(\mathbb{F}\) to its indeterminates. \par The main result that the authors obtain is the following: for any ACI-matrix \(M\) there exists a nonsingular matrix \(R\) and a permutation matrix \(Q\) such that \(RMQ\) is a matrix with the diagonal \(\mathbf{W}\mathbf{S}\mathbf{T}\) and zeros below the diagonal. Here \(\mathbf{W}\), \(\mathbf{S}\) and \(\mathbf{ T}\) are ACI-matrices, \(\mathbf{W}\) is wide (has more columns than rows), \(\mathbf{S}\) is square, \(\mathbf{T}\) is tall (has more rows than columns), and with these three blocks having at least one completion with full rank. These matrices are unique up to equivalence if \(\mathbf{S}\) is as large as possible for such a decomposition. Also, \(\mathbf{W}\), \(\mathbf{S}\) and \(\mathbf{T}\) are unique up to elementary row operations and column permutations.