Chow polynomials of totally nonnegative matrices and posets

Huh-Stevens and Ferroni-Schr\"oter independently conjectured that Hilbert-Poincar\'e series of Chow rings of geometric lattices have only real zeros. Ferroni, Matherne and the second author extended this conjecture to Chow polynomials of Cohen-Macaulay poset. In this paper we address the above conjectures by providing new defining relations and properties of Chow functions of posets and matrices. These are used, in conjunction with new techniques on interlacing sequences of polynomials, to prove that Chow polynomials of totally nonnegative matrices have only real zeros, which, in turn, proves the above conjectures for a class of posets that contains projective and affine geometries, face lattices of cubical polytopes, partition lattices and Dowling lattices, perfect matroid designs, and lattices of flats of paving matroids. We also study Chow polynomials of Toeplitz matrices in greater detail, and show how these are related the combinatorics of binomial and Sheffer posets, as well as to a family of generalized Eulerian polynomials with coefficients in the ring of symmetric polynomials that have been studied by e.g. Stanley, Brenti, Stembridge and Shareshian-Wachs.