Topic summary
Total unimodularity
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Unimodular matrix.
Total unimodularity
A totally unimodular matrix (TU matrix) is a matrix for which every square submatrix has determinant 0, +1 or −1. A totally unimodular matrix need not be square itself. From the definition it follows that any submatrix of a totally unimodular matrix is itself totally unimodular (TU). Furthermore it follows that any TU matrix has only 0, +1 or −1 entries. The converse is not true, i.e., a matrix with only 0, +1 or −1 entries is not necessarily unimodular. A matrix is TU if and only if its transpose is TU.