Bijective linear maps on semimodules spanned by Boolean matrices of fixed rank

AbstractLet Mm,n(B) be the semimodule of all m×n Boolean matrices where B is the Boolean algebra with two elements. Let k be a positive integer such that 2⩽k⩽minm,n. Let Bm,n,k denote the subsemimodule of Mm,n(B) spanned by the set of all rank k matrices. We show that if T is a bijective linear mapping on Bm,n,k, then there exist permutation matrices P and Q such that TA=PAQ for all A∈Bm,n,k or m=n and TA=PAtQ for all A∈Bm,n,k. This result follows from a more general theorem we prove concerning the structure of linear mappings on Bm,n,k that preserve both the weight of each matrix and rank one matrices of weight k2. Here the weight of a Boolean matrix is the number of its nonzero entries