On the largest eigenvalue of a symmetric nonnegative tensor

In this paper, some important spectral characterizations of symmetric nonnegative tensors are analyzed. In particular, it is shown that a symmetric nonnegative tensor has the following properties: (i) its spectral radius is zero if and only if it is a zero tensor; (ii) it is weakly irreducible (resp...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Zhou, Guanglu, Qi, L., Wu, S.
Format: Journal Article
Published: John Wiley & Sons Ltd 2013
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/25034
Description
Summary:In this paper, some important spectral characterizations of symmetric nonnegative tensors are analyzed. In particular, it is shown that a symmetric nonnegative tensor has the following properties: (i) its spectral radius is zero if and only if it is a zero tensor; (ii) it is weakly irreducible (respectively, irreducible) if and only if it has a unique positive (respectively, nonnegative) eigenvalue–eigenvector; (iii) the minimax theorem is satisfied without requiring the weak irreducibility condition; and (iv) if it is weakly reducible, then it can be decomposed into some weakly irreducible tensors. In addition, the problem of finding the largest eigenvalue of a symmetric nonnegative tensor is shown to be equivalent to finding the global solution of a convex optimization problem. Subsequently, algorithmic aspects for computing the largest eigenvalue of symmetric nonnegative tensors are discussed.