Alternative equivalent icosahedral irreducible tensors

Abstract

Abstract Some sets of icosahedral irreducible tensors can only be defined with respect to one of two seemingly equivalent choices of axes. The problem is explained and the cases when such an alternative choice may cause mixing of sets belonging to different irreducible representations are determined. It is found that the amount of mixing is a property of the spherical basis sets and is independent of the rank and of the permutation symmetry of the tensorial sets. It is further found that certain operators which change the handedness of the coordinate axes can similarly affect these sets, notwithstanding the centrosymmetry of the icosahedron.