  We investigate the finite-size corrections of the entanglement entropy of
critical ladders and propose a conjecture for its scaling behavior. The
conjecture is verified for free fermions, Heisenberg and quantum Ising ladders.
Our results support that the prefactor of the logarithmic correction of the
entanglement entropy of critical ladder models is universal and it is
associated with the central charge of the one-dimensional version of the models
and with the number of branches associated with gapless excitations. Our
results suggest that it is possible to infer whether there is a violation of
the entropic area law in two-dimensional critical systems by analyzing the
scaling behavior of the entanglement entropy of ladder systems, which are
easier to deal.
