Minimum Permanents of Tridiagonal Doubly Stochastic Matrices (Q4796503)

Minimum permanents and minimizing matrices of some cases of \(n \times n\) doubly stochastic matrices are determined. In the case of the \(n\)-square tridiagonal \((0,1)\)-matrix \(T_n\) the permanent is given as \(\mu(T_n)=1/2^{n-1}\) with the minimizing matrix \(A=[a_{i,j}]\) such that \(a_{1,1}=a_{n,n}= a_{k,k+1}=a_{k+1,k}=1/2\) for \(k=1,\dots ,n-1\). In another case of doubly stochastic matrices with prescribed 8 zero entries in the first three rows and columns the minimum permanent and the minimizing matrix are also determined.