Related papers: Optimal Thinning of MCMC Output
I introduce a Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) scheme in which sampling from a distribution with density pi(x) is done using updates operating on an "ensemble" of states. The current state x is first stochastically mapped to an ensemble,…
Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms for hidden Markov models often rely on the forward-backward sampler. This makes them computationally slow as the length of the time series increases, motivating the development of…
Markov chain Monte Carlo is a method of producing a correlated sample in order to estimate features of a target distribution via ergodic averages. A fundamental question is when should sampling stop? That is, when are the ergodic averages…
This paper presents how to use common random number (CRN) simulation to evaluate Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) convergence to stationarity. We provide an upper bound on the Wasserstein distance of a Markov chain to its stationary…
Stochastic gradient methods are the workhorse (algorithms) of large-scale optimization problems in machine learning, signal processing, and other computational sciences and engineering. This paper studies Markov chain gradient descent, a…
Stochastic approximation methods play a central role in maximum likelihood estimation problems involving intractable likelihood functions, such as marginal likelihoods arising in problems with missing or incomplete data, and in parametric…
In this paper we study asymptotic properties of different data-augmentation-type Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms sampling from mixture models comprising discrete as well as continuous random variables. Of particular interest to us is…
We construct a new Markov chain Monte Carlo method on finite states with optimal choices of acceptance-rejection ratio functions. We prove that the constructed continuous time Markov jumping process has a global in-time convergence rate in…
In this paper, we consider the finite-state approximation of a discrete-time constrained Markov decision process (MDP) under the discounted and average cost criteria. Using the linear programming formulation of the constrained discounted…
If the conclusion of a data analysis is sensitive to dropping very few data points, that conclusion might hinge on the particular data at hand rather than representing a more broadly applicable truth. How could we check whether this…
Markov chain Monte Carlo sampling methods often suffer from long correlation times. Consequently, these methods must be run for many steps to generate an independent sample. In this paper a method is proposed to overcome this difficulty.…
Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms are used to simulate from complex statistical distributions by way of a local exploration of these distributions. This local feature avoids heavy requests on understanding the nature of the target, but it…
Performing numerical integration when the integrand itself cannot be evaluated point-wise is a challenging task that arises in statistical analysis, notably in Bayesian inference for models with intractable likelihood functions. Markov…
The Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm is a widely recognised as an efficient method for sampling a specified posterior distribution. However, when the posterior is multi-modal, conventional MCMC algorithms either tend to become…
Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods have not been broadly adopted in Bayesian neural networks (BNNs). This paper initially reviews the main challenges in sampling from the parameter posterior of a neural network via MCMC. Such…
Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods asymptotically sample from complex probability distributions. The pseudo-marginal MCMC framework only requires an unbiased estimator of the unnormalized probability distribution function to construct…
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…
Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) has transformed Bayesian model inference over the past three decades: mainly because of this, Bayesian inference is now a workhorse of applied scientists. Under general conditions, MCMC sampling converges…
Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods such as Gibbs sampling are finding widespread use in applied statistics and machine learning. These often lead to difficult computational problems, which are increasingly being solved on parallel and…
Smoothing in state-space models amounts to computing the conditional distribution of the latent state trajectory, given observations, or expectations of functionals of the state trajectory with respect to this distributions. For models that…