Related papers: On a Metropolis-Hastings importance sampling estim…
We develop an algorithm for automatic differentiation of Metropolis-Hastings samplers, allowing us to differentiate through probabilistic inference, even if the model has discrete components within it. Our approach fuses recent advances in…
Multiple-try Metropolis (MTM) is a popular Markov chain Monte Carlo method with the appealing feature of being amenable to parallel computing. At each iteration, it samples several candidates for the next state of the Markov chain and…
We present a new multiple-try Metropolis-Hastings algorithm designed to be especially beneficial when a tailored proposal distribution is available. The algorithm is based on a given acyclic graph $G$, where one of the nodes in $G$, $k$…
We investigate the properties of the Hybrid Monte-Carlo algorithm (HMC) in high dimensions. HMC develops a Markov chain reversible w.r.t. a given target distribution $\Pi$ by using separable Hamiltonian dynamics with potential $-\log\Pi$.…
We introduce a new Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampler called the Markov Interacting Importance Sampler (MIIS). The MIIS sampler uses conditional importance sampling (IS) approximations to jointly sample the current state of the Markov…
This paper considers importance sampling for estimation of rare-event probabilities in a specific collection of Markovian jump processes used for e.g. modelling of credit risk. Previous attempts at designing importance sampling algorithms…
Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms are widely used for stochastic optimization, sampling, and integration of mathematical objective functions, in particular, in the context of Bayesian inverse problems and parameter estimation. For…
We investigate the efficiency of a marginal likelihood estimator where the product of the marginal posterior distributions is used as an importance-sampling function. The approach is generally applicable to multi-block parameter vector…
We propose a new class of learning algorithms that combines variational approximation and Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation. Naive algorithms that use the variational approximation as proposal distribution can perform poorly…
Markov chain Monte Carlo methods are often deemed too computationally intensive to be of any practical use for big data applications, and in particular for inference on datasets containing a large number $n$ of individual data points, also…
The multi-point Metropolis algorithm is an advanced MCMC technique based on drawing several correlated samples at each step and choosing one of them according to some normalized weights. We propose a variation of this technique where the…
Hamiltonian Monte Carlo (HMC) has been progressively incorporated within the statistician's toolbox as an alternative sampling method in settings when standard Metropolis-Hastings is inefficient. HMC generates a Markov chain on an augmented…
The Hastings algorithm is a key tool in computational science. While mathematically justified by detailed balance, it can be conceptually difficult to grasp. Here, we present two complementary and intuitive ways to derive and understand the…
We consider the problem of estimating the asymptotic variance of a function defined on a Markov chain, an important step for statistical inference of the stationary mean. We design a novel recursive estimator that requires $O(1)$…
We propose a novel Metropolis-Hastings algorithm to sample uniformly from the space of correlation matrices. Existing methods in the literature are based on elaborated representations of a correlation matrix, or on complex parametrizations…
This paper proposes a new Sequential Monte Carlo algorithm to perform online estimation in the context of state space models when either the transition density of the latent state or the conditional likelihood of an observation given a…
We establish an ordering criterion for the asymptotic variances of two consistent Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) estimators: an importance sampling (IS) estimator, based on an approximate reversible chain and subsequent IS weighting, and a…
A well-known difficult problem regarding Metropolis-Hastings algorithms is to get sharp bounds on their convergence rates. Moreover, a fundamental but often overlooked problem in Markov chain theory is to study the convergence rates for…
We propose a weighting scheme for the proposals within Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms and show how this can improve statistical efficiency at no extra computational cost. These methods are most powerful when combined with…
Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms are commonly used for their versatility in sampling from complicated probability distributions. However, as the dimension of the distribution gets larger, the computational costs for a satisfactory…