Related papers: Convergence Bounds for Monte Carlo Markov Chains

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is a sampling-based method for estimating features of probability distributions. MCMC methods produce a serially correlated, yet representative, sample from the desired distribution. As such it can be…

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is a powerful methodology for the approximation of posterior distributions. However, the iterative nature of MCMC does not naturally facilitate its use with modern highly parallel computation on HPC and cloud…

Perturbation theory for Markov chains addresses the question how small differences in the transitions of Markov chains are reflected in differences between their distributions. We prove powerful and flexible bounds on the distance of the…

Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms are often used for approximate inference inside learning, but their slow mixing can be difficult to diagnose and the approximations can seriously degrade learning. To alleviate these issues, we…

We investigate lower bounds on the subgeometric convergence of adaptive Markov chain Monte Carlo under any adaptation strategy. In particular, we prove general lower bounds in total variation and on the weak convergence rate under general…

Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is a popular class of statistical methods for simulating autocorrelated draws from target distributions, including posterior distributions in Bayesian analysis. An important consideration in using simulated…

In this paper we investigate the continuum limits of a class of Markov chains. The investigation of such limits is motivated by the desire to model very large networks. We show that under some conditions, a sequence of Markov chains…

The Monte Carlo within Metropolis (MCwM) algorithm, interpreted as a perturbed Metropolis-Hastings (MH) algorithm, provides an approach for approximate sampling when the target distribution is intractable. Assuming the unperturbed Markov…

MCMC methods (Monte Carlo Markov Chain) are a class of methods used to perform simulations per a probability distribution $P$. These methods are often used when we have difficulties to directly sample per a given probability distribution…

A common tool in the practice of Markov Chain Monte Carlo is to use approximating transition kernels to speed up computation when the desired kernel is slow to evaluate or intractable. A limited set of quantitative tools exist to assess the…

Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) techniques are now widely used for cosmological parameter estimation. Chains are generated to sample the posterior probability distribution obtained following the Bayesian approach. An important issue is how…

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…

Markov chain Monte Carlo methods are a powerful tool for sampling equilibrium configurations in complex systems. One problem these methods often face is slow convergence over large energy barriers. In this work, we propose a novel method…

We develop a modular approach to Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampling for unnormalized target densities. In this approach, Markov chains are constructed in parallel, each constrained to a subset of the target space. The Monte Carlo…

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms are based on the construction of a Markov chain with transition probabilities leaving invariant a probability distribution of interest. In this work, we look at these transition probabilities as…

In many situations it is important to be able to propose $N$ independent realizations of a given distribution law. We propose a strategy for making $N$ parallel Monte Carlo Markov Chains (MCMC) interact in order to get an approximation of…

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is the engine of modern Bayesian statistics, being used to approximate the posterior and derived quantities of interest. Despite this, the issue of how the output from a Markov chain is post-processed and…

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…

We show that Markov couplings can be used to improve the accuracy of Markov chain Monte Carlo calculations in some situations where the steady-state probability distribution is not explicitly known. The technique generalizes the notion of…

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…