Related papers: Existence of maximum likelihood estimates in expon…
Exponential random graph models (ERGMs) are widely used for modeling social networks observed at one point in time. However the computational difficulty of ERGM parameter estimation has limited the practical application of this class of…
Inspired by applications to theories of coding and communication in networks of nervous tissue, we study maximum entropy distributions on weighted graphs with a given expected degree sequence. These distributions are characterized by…
We study parameter estimation in linear Gaussian covariance models, which are $p$-dimensional Gaussian models with linear constraints on the covariance matrix. Maximum likelihood estimation for this class of models leads to a non-convex…
The maximum likelihood degree of a statistical model refers to the number of solutions, where the derivative of the log-likelihood function is zero, over the complex field. This paper examines the maximum likelihood degree of the parameter…
Statistical models for social networks have enabled researchers to study complex social phenomena that give rise to observed patterns of relationships among social actors and to gain a rich understanding of the interdependent nature of…
Exponential family Random Graph Models (ERGMs) can be viewed as expressing a probability distribution on graphs arising from the action of competing social forces that make ties more or less likely, depending on the state of the rest of the…
This paper studies the partial estimation of Gaussian graphical models from high-dimensional empirical observations. We derive a convex formulation for this problem using $\ell_1$-regularized maximum-likelihood estimation, which can be…
Maximum regularized likelihood estimators (MRLEs) are arguably the most established class of estimators in high-dimensional statistics. In this paper, we derive guarantees for MRLEs in Kullback-Leibler divergence, a general measure of…
An open problem in graphical Gaussian models is to determine the smallest number of observations needed to guarantee the existence of the maximum likelihood estimator of the covariance matrix with probability one. In this paper we formalize…
We study the uniqueness of optimal solutions to extremal graph theory problems. Lovasz conjectured that every finite feasible set of subgraph density constraints can be extended further by a finite set of density constraints so that the…
We present new stochastic geometry theorems that give bounds on the probability that $m$ random data classes all contain a point in common in their convex hulls. We apply these stochastic separation theorems to obtain bounds on the…
The exponential family random graph modeling (ERGM) framework provides a flexible approach for the statistical analysis of networks. As ERGMs typically involve normalizing factors that are costly to compute, practical inference relies on a…
The exponential random graph (ERGM) model is a commonly used statistical framework for studying the determinants of tie formations from social network data. To test scientific theories under the ERGM framework, statistical inferential…
The three-parameter generalized extreme value distribution arises from classical univariate extreme value theory and is in common use for analyzing the far tail of observed phenomena. Curiously, important asymptotic properties of…
We establish connections between invariant theory and maximum likelihood estimation for discrete statistical models. We show that norm minimization over a torus orbit is equivalent to maximum likelihood estimation in log-linear models. We…
Let $E$ be an arbitrary directed graph and let $L$ be the Leavitt path algebra of the graph $E$ over a field $K$. The necessary and sufficient con- ditions are given to assure the existence of a maximal ideal in $L$ and also the necessary…
Estimating the matrix of connections probabilities is one of the key questions when studying sparse networks. In this work, we consider networks generated under the sparse graphon model and the in-homogeneous random graph model with missing…
In finite mixtures of location-scale distributions, if there is no constraint on the parameters then the maximum likelihood estimate does not exist. But when the ratios of the scale parameters are restricted appropriately, the maximum…
We consider distributed estimation of the inverse covariance matrix, also called the concentration or precision matrix, in Gaussian graphical models. Traditional centralized estimation often requires global inference of the covariance…
Maximum likelihood (ML) estimation is widely used in statistics. The h-likelihood has been proposed as an extension of Fisher's likelihood to statistical models including unobserved latent variables of recent interest. Its advantage is that…