Related papers: Hitting Times in Markov Chains with Restart and th…
We study the problem of characterizing the expected hitting times for a robust generalization of continuous-time Markov chains. This generalization is based on the theory of imprecise probabilities, and the models with which we work…
In the present paper, we investigate the relationship between hitting times and hitting probabilities in discrete-time imprecise Markov chains (IMCs). We define lower and upper hitting times and probabilities for IMCs whose set of…
We develop a new bidirectional algorithm for estimating Markov chain multi-step transition probabilities: given a Markov chain, we want to estimate the probability of hitting a given target state in $\ell$ steps after starting from a given…
We consider a general honest homogeneous continuous-time Markov process with restarts. The process is forced to restart from a given distribution at time moments generated by an independent Poisson process. The motivation to study such…
The distribution of the "mixing time" or the "time to stationarity" in a discrete time irreducible Markov chain, starting in state i, can be defined as the number of trials to reach a state sampled from the stationary distribution of the…
This study introduces a novel approach for learning mixtures of Markov chains, a critical process applicable to various fields, including healthcare and the analysis of web users. Existing research has identified a clear divide in…
We present a novel algorithm to solve a non-linear system of equations, whose solution can be interpreted as a tight lower bound on the vector of expected hitting times of a Markov chain whose transition probabilities are only partially…
We consider the problem of characterising expected hitting times and hitting probabilities for imprecise Markov chains. To this end, we consider three distinct ways in which imprecise Markov chains have been defined in the literature: as…
In this brief note, we find formulas for the distribution and the transition probability matrices of a stochastic process described as a time-reversion in a finite time window of a Markov chain, with cluster observation of the Markov state…
The convergence, convergence rate and expected hitting time play fundamental roles in the analysis of randomised search heuristics. This paper presents a unified Markov chain approach to studying them. Using the approach, the sufficient and…
The paper studies an improved estimate for the rate of convergence for nonlinear homogeneous discrete-time Markov chains. These processes are nonlinear in terms of the distribution law. Hence, the transition kernels are dependent on the…
In this paper we are concerned with hitting times of a family of density-dependent Markov chains. A moderate deviation principle of the hitting time is given. The proof of the main theorem relies heavily on moderate deviations of…
Let 0<\alpha<1/2. We show that the mixing time of a continuous-time reversible Markov chain on a finite state space is about as large as the largest expected hitting time of a subset of stationary measure at least \alpha of the state space.…
Computational procedures for the stationary probability distribution, the group inverse of the Markovian kernel and the mean first passage times of an irreducible Markov chain, are developed using perturbations. The derivation of these…
The first hitting times of a stochastic process, i.e., the first time a process reaches a particular level, are of significant interest across various scientific disciplines, including biology, chemistry, and economics. We modify the…
We consider irreducible reversible discrete time Markov chains on a finite state space. Mixing times and hitting times are fundamental parameters of the chain. We relate them by showing that the mixing time of the lazy chain is equivalent…
Random walks (or Markov chains) are models extensively used in theoretical computer science. Several tools, including analysis of quantities such as hitting and mixing times, are helpful for devising randomized algorithms. A notable example…
In this paper, we extend hitting times for imprecise Markov chains to the framework of weighted imprecise Markov chains (WIMCs), in which each transition is associated with a strictly positive weight encoded by a matrix $W$. Given a convex…
We present an algorithm that can efficiently compute a broad class of inferences for discrete-time imprecise Markov chains, a generalised type of Markov chains that allows one to take into account partially specified probabilities and other…
The hitting and mixing times are two fundamental quantities associated with Markov chains. In Peres and Sousi[PS2015] and Oliveira[Oli2012], the authors show that the mixing times and "worst-case" hitting times of reversible Markov chains…