Unbounded matroids

Abstract

A matroid base polytope is a polytope in which each vertex has 0,1 coordinates and each edge is parallel to a difference of two coordinate vectors. Matroid base polytopes are described combinatorially by integral submodular functions on a boolean lattice, satisfying the unit increase property. We define a more general class of unbounded matroids, or U-matroids, by replacing the boolean lattice with an arbitrary distributive lattice. U-matroids thus serve as a combinatorial model for polyhedra that satisfy the vertex and edge conditions of matroid base polytopes, but may be unbounded. Like polymatroids, U-matroids generalize matroids and arise as a special case of submodular systems. We prove that every U-matroid admits a canonical largest extension to a matroid, which we call the generous extension; the analogous geometric statement is that every U-matroid base polyhedron contains a unique largest matroid base polytope. We show that the supports of vertices of a U-matroid base polyhedron span a shellable simplicial complex, and we characterize U-matroid basis systems in terms of shelling orders, generalizing Björner's and Gale's criteria for a simplicial complex to be a matroid independence complex. Finally, we present an application of our theory to subspace arrangements and show that the generous extension has a natural geometric interpretation in this setting.