Rephasing invariance and neutrino mixing

A rephasing invariant parametrization is introduced for three flavor neutrino mixing. For neutrino propagation in matter, these parameters are shown to obey evolution equations as functions of the induced neutrino mass. These equations are found to preserve (approximately) some characteristic features of the mixing matrix, resulting in solutions which exhibit striking patterns as the induced mass varies. The approximate solutions are compared to numerical integrations and found to be quite accurate.