Positivity properties of the matrix \({\left[(i+j)^{i+j}\right]}\) (Q466783)

Given positive reals \(p_1<p_2<\cdots<p_n\), consider the \(n\times n\) matrix whose \(i,j\)th entry is \(s_{ij}:=(p_i+p_j)^{p_i+p_j}\). In this short article, the authors prove that this matrix is infinitely divisible (i.e., for every positive real \(r>0\) the matrix \((s_{ij}^r)_{i,j}\) is positive semidefinite), nonsingular and totally positive (i.e., all minors are nonnegative). In operator theoretic terms, the kernel \((0,\infty)^2\to(0,\infty)\) defined by \((x,y)\mapsto (x+y)^{x+y}\) is infinitely divisible and totally positive.