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The space of compatible full conditionals is a unimodular toric variety

Algebraic Geometry 2007-06-13 v1 Combinatorics Statistics Theory Statistics Theory

Abstract

The set of all m-tuples of compatible full conditional distributions on discrete random variables is an algebraic set whose defining ideal is a unimodular toric ideal. We identify the defining polynomials of these ideals with closed walks on a bipartite graph. Our algebraic characterization provides a natural generalization of the requirement that compatible conditionals have identical odds ratios and holds regardless of the patterns of zeros in the conditional arrays.

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Cite

@article{arxiv.math/0405046,
  title  = {The space of compatible full conditionals is a unimodular toric variety},
  author = {Aleksandra B Slavkovic and Seth Sullivant},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:math/0405046},
  year   = {2007}
}

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15 pages