An even order symmetric B tensor is positive definite

Abstract

It is easily checkable if a given tensor is a B tensor, or a B0 tensor or not. In this paper, we show that a symmetric B tensor can always be decomposed to the sum of a strictly diagonally dominated symmetric M tensor and several positive multiples of partially all one tensors, and a symmetric B0 tensor can always be decomposed to the sum of a diagonally dominated symmetric M tensor and several positive multiples of partially all one tensors. When the order is even, this implies that the corresponding B tensor is positive definite, and the corresponding B0 tensor is positive semi-definite. This gives a checkable sufficient condition for positive definite and semi-definite tensors. This approach is different from the approach in the literature for proving a symmetric B matrix is positive definite, as that matrix approach cannot be extended to the tensor case.