Magic partially filled arrays on abelian groups

Abstract

In this paper we introduce a special class of partially filled arrays. A magic partially filled array $\mathrm{MPF}_\Omega(m,n; s,k)$ on a subset $\Omega$ of an abelian group $(\Gamma,+)$ is a partially filled array of size $m\times n$ with entries in $\Omega$ such that $(i)$ every $\omega \in \Omega$ appears once in the array; $(ii)$ each row contains $s$ filled cells and each column contains $k$ filled cells; $(iii)$ there exist (not necessarily distinct) elements $x,y\in \Gamma$ such that the sum of the elements in each row is $x$ and the sum of the elements in each column is $y$. In particular, if $x=y=0_\Gamma$, we have a zero-sum magic partially filled array ${}^0\mathrm{MPF}_\Omega(m,n; s,k)$. Examples of these objects are magic rectangles, $\Gamma$-magic rectangles, signed magic arrays, (integer or non integer) Heffter arrays. Here, we give necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a magic rectangle with empty cells, i.e., of an $\mathrm{MPF}_\Omega(m,n;s,k)$ where $\Omega=\{1,2,\ldots,nk\}\subset\mathbb{Z}$. We also construct zero-sum magic partially filled arrays when $\Omega$ is the abelian group $\Gamma$ or the set of its nonzero elements.