Permutation matrix

In mathematics, particularly in matrix theory, a permutation matrix is a square binary matrix that has exactly one entry of $1$ in each row and each column and $0$s elsewhere. Each such matrix, say $P$, represents a permutation of $m$ elements and, when used to multiply another matrix, say $A$, results in permuting the rows (when pre-multiplying, to form $PA$) or columns (when post-multiplying, to form $AP$) of the matrix $A$.

1 Definition

Given a permutation $\pi$ of $m$ elements,
π : { 1 , … , m } → { 1 , … , m } {\displaystyle \pi :\lbrace 1,\ldots ,m\rbrace \to \lbrace 1,\ldots ,m\rbrace } π:{1,…,m}→{1,…,m}
represented in two-line form by
$\left(\begin{array}{cccc}1& 2& \cdots & m\\ \pi (1)& \pi (2)& \cdots & \pi (m)\end{array}\right),$
there are two natural ways to associate the permutation with a permutation matrix; namely, starting with the $m\times m$ identity matrix, $I_m$, either permute the columns or permute the rows, according to $\pi$. Both methods of defining permutation matrices appear in the literature and the properties expressed in one representation can be easily converted to the other representation. This article will primarily deal with just one of these representations and the other will only be mentioned when there is a difference to be aware of.

The $m\times m$ permutation matrix $P_{\pi }=(p_{ij})$ obtained by permuting the columns of the identity matrix $I_m$, that is, for each $i$, $p_{ij}=1$ if $j=\pi (i)$ and $p_{ij}=0$ otherwise, will be referred to as the column representation in this article. Since the entries in row $i$ are all $0$ except that a $1$ appears in column $\pi (i)$, we may write
$P_{\pi }=\left[\begin{array}{c}{\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (1)}\\ {\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (2)}\\ ⋮\\ {\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (m)}\end{array}\right],$
where $e_j$, a standard basis vector, denotes a row vector of length $m$ with $1$ in the $j$th position and $0$ in every other position.

For example, the permutation matrix $P_{\pi }$ corresponding to the permutation $\pi =\left(\begin{array}{ccccc}1& 2& 3& 4& 5\\ 1& 4& 2& 5& 3\end{array}\right)$ is
$P_{\pi }=\left[\begin{array}{c}{\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (1)}\\ {\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (2)}\\ {\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (3)}\\ {\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (4)}\\ {\mathbf{e}}_{\pi (5)}\end{array}\right]=\left[\begin{array}{c}{\mathbf{e}}_1\\ {\mathbf{e}}_4\\ {\mathbf{e}}_2\\ {\mathbf{e}}_5\\ {\mathbf{e}}_3\end{array}\right]=\left[\begin{array}{ccccc}1& 0& 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0& 1& 0\\ 0& 1& 0& 0& 0\\ 0& 0& 0& 0& 1\\ 0& 0& 1& 0& 0\end{array}\right].$
Observe that the $j$th column of the $I_5$ identity matrix now appears as the $\pi (j)$th column of $P_{\pi }$.

The other representation, obtained by permuting the rows of the identity matrix $I_m$, that is, for each $j,p_{ij}=1$ if $i=\pi (j)$ and $p_{ij}=0$ otherwise, will be referred to as the row representation.

2 Properties

3 Matrix group

4 Doubly stochastic matrices

5 Linear algebraic properties

6 Examples

6.1 Permutation of rows and columns

6.2 Permutation of rows

7 Explanation

8 Restricted forms

9 See also

10 References