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Stein Variational Gradient Descent (SVGD) is a deterministic interacting-particle method for sampling from a target probability measure given access to its score function. In the mean-field and continuous-time limit, it is known that the…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2026-05-12 Lénaïc Chizat , Maria Colombo , Roberto Colombo , Xavier Fernández-Real

We show how the infinitesimal exchangeable pairs approach to Stein's method combines naturally with the theory of Markov semigroups. We present a multivariate normal approximation theorem for functions of a random variable invariant with…

Probability · Mathematics 2025-10-01 David Grzybowski , Mark Meckes

We propose a novel particle-based variational inference method designed to work with multimodal distributions. Our approach, referred to as Branched Stein Variational Gradient Descent (BSVGD), extends the classical Stein Variational…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-07-18 Isaías Bañales , Arturo Jaramillo , Joshué Helí Ricalde-Guerrero

We study the Stein Variational Gradient Descent (SVGD) algorithm, which optimises a set of particles to approximate a target probability distribution $\pi\propto e^{-V}$ on $\mathbb{R}^d$. In the population limit, SVGD performs gradient…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2021-01-05 Anna Korba , Adil Salim , Michael Arbel , Giulia Luise , Arthur Gretton

We prove a bound for the Wasserstein distance between vectors of smooth complex random variables and complex Gaussians in the framework of complex Markov diffusion generators. For the special case of chaotic eigenfunctions, this bound can…

Probability · Mathematics 2015-11-03 Simon Campese

We extend the celebrated Stone's theorem to the framework of distributional regression. More precisely, we prove that weighted empirical distribution with local probability weights satisfying the conditions of Stone's theorem provide…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2023-02-03 Clément Dombry , Thibault Modeste , Romain Pic

We propose a novel distributed inference algorithm for continuous graphical models, by extending Stein variational gradient descent (SVGD) to leverage the Markov dependency structure of the distribution of interest. Our approach combines…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2018-06-11 Dilin Wang , Zhe Zeng , Qiang Liu

Much of machine learning relies on comparing distributions with discrepancy measures. Stein's method creates discrepancy measures between two distributions that require only the unnormalized density of one and samples from the other. Stein…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2020-07-21 Raghav Singhal , Xintian Han , Saad Lahlou , Rajesh Ranganath

An important task in computational statistics and machine learning is to approximate a posterior distribution $p(x)$ with an empirical measure supported on a set of representative points $\{x_i\}_{i=1}^n$. This paper focuses on methods…

This monograph provides a rigorous overview of theoretical and methodological aspects of probabilistic inference and learning with Stein's method. Recipes are provided for constructing Stein discrepancies from Stein operators and Stein…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2026-03-10 Qiang Liu , Lester Mackey , Chris Oates

We propose a novel method for measuring the discrepancy between a set of samples and a desired posterior distribution for Bayesian inference. Classical methods for assessing sample quality like the effective sample size are not appropriate…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2026-05-01 Narayan Srinivasan , Matthew Sutton , Christopher Drovandi , Leah F South

This work presents a multilevel variant of Stein variational gradient descent to more efficiently sample from target distributions. The key ingredient is a sequence of distributions with growing fidelity and costs that converges to the…

Numerical Analysis · Mathematics 2021-04-06 Terrence Alsup , Luca Venturi , Benjamin Peherstorfer

Stein variational gradient descent (SVGD) was recently proposed as a general purpose nonparametric variational inference algorithm [Liu & Wang, NIPS 2016]: it minimizes the Kullback-Leibler divergence between the target distribution and its…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2018-10-31 Gianluca Detommaso , Tiangang Cui , Alessio Spantini , Youssef Marzouk , Robert Scheichl

Let $h$ be a three times partially differentiable function on $R^n$, let $X=(X_1,\dots,X_n)$ be a collection of real-valued random variables and let $Z=(Z_1,\dots,Z_n)$ be a multivariate Gaussian vector. In this article, we develop Stein's…

Probability · Mathematics 2015-05-27 Adrian Röllin

Stein operators allow to characterise probability distributions via differential operators. Based on these characterisations, we develop a new method of point estimation for marginal parameters of strictly stationary and ergodic processes,…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2024-12-05 Bruno Ebner , Adrian Fischer , Robert E. Gaunt , Babette Picker , Yvik Swan

Stein discrepancies have emerged as a powerful statistical tool, being applied to fundamental statistical problems including parameter inference, goodness-of-fit testing, and sampling. The canonical Stein discrepancies require the…

Computation · Statistics 2022-07-20 Matthew A Fisher , Chris. J Oates

We propose a kernel-based nonparametric test of relative goodness of fit, where the goal is to compare two models, both of which may have unobserved latent variables, such that the marginal distribution of the observed variables is…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2023-05-10 Heishiro Kanagawa , Wittawat Jitkrittum , Lester Mackey , Kenji Fukumizu , Arthur Gretton

We derive a new discrepancy statistic for measuring differences between two probability distributions based on combining Stein's identity with the reproducing kernel Hilbert space theory. We apply our result to test how well a probabilistic…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2016-07-04 Qiang Liu , Jason D. Lee , Michael I. Jordan

One of the key ingredients to successfully apply Stein's method for distributional approximation are solutions to the Stein equations and their derivatives. Using Barbour's generator approach, one can solve for the solutions to the Stein…

Probability · Mathematics 2019-06-04 Han L. Gan

Stein kernels are a way of comparing probability distributions, defined via integration by parts formulas. We provide two constructions of Stein kernels in free probability. One is given by an explicit formula, and the other via free…

Operator Algebras · Mathematics 2018-11-08 Guillaume Cébron , Max Fathi , Tobias Mai