Completely Positive Tensors and Multi-Hypergraphs

Abstract

Completely positive graphs have been employed to associate with completely positive matrices for characterizing the intrinsic zero patterns. As tensors have been widely recognized as a higher-order extension of matrices, the multi-hypergraph, regarded as a generalization of graphs, is then introduced to associate with tensors for the study of complete positivity. To describe the dependence of the corresponding zero pattern for a special type of completely positive tensors--the $\{0,1\}$ completely positive tensors, the completely positive multi-hypergraph is defined. By characterizing properties of the associated multi-hypergraph, we provide necessary and sufficient conditions for any $(0,1)$ associated tensor to be $\{0,1\}$ completely positive. Furthermore, a necessary and sufficient condition for a uniform multi-hypergraph to be completely positive multi-hypergraph is proposed as well.