Principal invariants and inherent parameters of diffusion kurtosis tensors (Q952156)

A diffusion kurtosis tensor is a fourth order three-dimensional fully symmetric tensor. Under a Cartesian coordinate system it is represented by a real array which has fifteen independent elements \(W=(W_{ijkl})\) with \(W_{ijkl}\) being invariant for any permutation of its indices \(i, j, k, l=1,2,3\). This tensor is used in medical engineering. The authors study some quantities and parameters related to this tensor that are independent of coordinate system choice. They include the largest, the smallest, and the average apparent kurtosis coefficients values, and some parameters formed by the eigenvector system of the second order diffusion tensor. The formulas for their computation and their relationships are explored.