Given a square matrix and single right and left, starting vectors, the clas
sical nonsymmetric Lanczos process generates two sequences of biorthogonal
basis vectors for the right and left Krylov subspaces induced by the given
matrix and vectors. In this paper, we propose a Lanczos-type algorithm that
extends the classical Lanczos process for single starting vectors to multi
ple starting vectors. Given a square matrix and two blocks of right and lef
t starting vectors, the algorithm generates two sequences of biorthogonal b
asis vectors for the right and left block Krylov subspaces induced by the g
iven data. The algorithm can handle the most general case of right and left
starting blocks of arbitrary sizes, while all previously proposed extensio
ns of the Lanczos process are restricted to right and left starting blocks
of identical sizes. Other features of our algorithm include a built-in defl
ation procedure to detect and delete linearly dependent vectors in the bloc
k Krylov sequences, and the option to employ look-ahead to remedy the poten
tial breakdowns that may occur in nonsymmetric Lanczos-type methods.