Multivariate control charts typically plot the 
 statistic, which is a summary of multivariate variation. The classical 
 statistic is defined in Classical 
 Charts. When there is high correlation among the process variables, the correlation matrix is nearly singular. The subspace in which
            the process varies can be adequately explained by fewer variables than the original p variables. Thus, the principal component approach to multivariate control charts is to project the original p variables into a lower-dimensional subspace by using a model based on j principal components, where 
. 
         
The key to the relationship between principal components and multivariate control charts is the decomposition of the sample
            covariance matrix, 
, into the form 
, where 
 is a diagonal matrix (Jackson, 1991; Mardia, Kent, and Bibby, 1979). This is also the eigenvalue decomposition of 
, where the columns of 
 are the eigenvectors and the diagonal elements of 
 are the eigenvalues. 
         
 The 
 statistic that is produced by the full principal component model is equivalent to the classical 
 statistic. This is seen in the matrix representation of the 
 statistic computed from a principal component model that uses all p components, 
            
Because 
 is the zero matrix by construction, then 
            
 Because 
, then 
            
![\[  \begin{array}{rl} T^2_ i &  = \mb {t}_ i^{\prime } \mb {L}^{-1}_ n \mb {t}_ i \\ &  = \left( \bP ^{\prime } \left( \mb {x_ i}- \bar{ \mb {x} } \right) \right)^{\prime } \mb {L}^{-1}_ n \left( \bP ^{\prime } \left( \mb {x_ i}- \bar{\mb {x} } \right) \right) \\ &  = \left( \mb {x}_ i- \bar{ \mb {x} } \right)^{\prime } \mb {P} \mb {L}^{-1}_ n \mb {P}^{\prime } \left( \mb {x}_ i - \bar{ \mb {x} } \right) \\ &  = \left( \mb {x}_ i- \bar{ \mb {x} } \right)^{\prime } \bS ^{-1} \left( \mb {x}_ i- \bar{ \mb {x} } \right) \end{array}  \]](images/qcug_mvpmodel0038.png)
 which is the classical form. Consequently the classical 
 statistic can be expressed as a sum of squares, 
            
 where 
 is the variance of the kth principal component. 
            
 Creating a 
 chart that is based on a principal component model begins with choosing the number (j) of principal components. Effectively, this involves selecting a subspace in 
 dimensions and then creating a 
 statistic based on that j-component model. 
            
The 
 statistic is meant to monitor variation in the model space. However, if variation appears in the 
 subspace orthogonal to model space, then the model assumptions and physical process should be reexamined. Variation outside
               the model space can be detected with an SPE chart. 
            
In a model with j principal components, the 
 statistic is calculated as 
            
 where 
 is the principal component score for the kth principal component of the ith observation and 
 is the standard deviation of 
. 
            
The information in the remaining 
 principal components is monitored with charts for the SPE statistic, which is calculated as