Related papers: Prophet inequalities for i.i.d. random variables w…

In the classic prophet inequality, samples from independent random variables arrive online. A gambler that knows the distributions must decide at each point in time whether to stop and pick the current sample or to continue and lose that…

In the prophet secretary problem, $n$ values are drawn independently from known distributions, and presented in a uniformly random order. A decision-maker must accept or reject each value when it is presented, and may accept at most $k$…

We consider prophet inequalities subject to feasibility constraints that are the intersection of $q$ matroids. The best-known algorithms achieve a $\Theta(q)$-approximation, even when restricted to instances that are the intersection of $q$…

The telegraph process $X(t)$, $t>0$, (Goldstein, 1951) and the geometric telegraph process $S(t) = s_0 \exp\{(\mu -\frac12\sigma^2)t + \sigma X(t)\}$ with $\mu$ a known constant and $\sigma>0$ a parameter are supposed to be observed at…

We consider stochastic variational inequalities with monotone operators defined as the expected value of a random operator. We assume the feasible set is the intersection of a large family of convex sets. We propose a method that combines…

The rich literature on online Bayesian selection problems has long focused on so-called prophet inequalities, which compare the gain of an online algorithm to that of a "prophet" who knows the future. An equally-natural, though…

Prophet inequalities consist of many beautiful statements that establish tight performance ratios between online and offline allocation algorithms. Typically, tightness is established by constructing an algorithmic guarantee and a…

Let G=(V,E) be an undirected loopless graph with possible parallel edges and s and t be two vertices of G. Assume that vertex s is labelled at the initial time step and that every labelled vertex copies its labelling to neighbouring…

Let S_n=X_1+...+X_n be a sum of independent symmetric random variables such that |X_{i}|\leq 1. Denote by W_n=\epsilon_{1}+...+\epsilon_{n} a sum of independent random variables such that \prob{\eps_i = \pm 1} = 1/2. We prove that…

Let $\{\xi_1,\xi_2,\ldots\}$ be a sequence of independent random variables, and $\eta$ be a counting random variable independent of this sequence. In addition, let $S_0:=0$ and $S_n:=\xi_1+\xi_2+\cdots+\xi_n$ for $n\geqslant1$. We consider…

We consider a random walk among i.i.d. obstacles on the one dimensional integer lattice under the condition that the walk starts from the origin and reaches a remote location y. The obstacles are represented by a killing potential, which…

We consider a point process $i+\xi_i$, where $i\in \bZ$ and the $\xi_{i}$'s are i.i.d. random variables with variance $\sigma^{2}$. This process, with a suitable rescaling of the distribution of $\xi_i$'s, converges to the Poisson process…

We consider the prophet inequality problem for (not necessarily bipartite) matching problems with independent edge values, under both edge arrivals and vertex arrivals. We show constant-factor prophet inequalities for the case where the…

We study a pricing problem where a seller has $k$ identical copies of a product, buyers arrive sequentially, and the seller prices the items aiming to maximize social welfare. When $k=1$, this is the so called "prophet inequality" problem…

We consider an inhomogeneous Poisson process $X$ on $[0,T]$. The intensity function of $X$ is supposed to be strictly positive and smooth on $[0,T]$ except at the point $\theta$, in which it has either a 0-type singularity (tends to 0 like…

We consider the behavior of extremal particles in $K$-symmetric exclusion on $\mathbb{Z}$ when the process starts from certain infinite-particle step configurations where there are no particles to the right of a maximal one. In such a…

The variation of a martingale $p_0^k=p_0,...,p_k$ of probabilities on a finite (or countable) set $X$ is denoted $V(p_0^k)$ and defined by $V(p_0^k)=E(\sum_{t=1}^k|p_t-p_{t-1}|_1)$. It is shown that $V(p_0^k)\leq \sqrt{2kH(p_0)}$, where…

There are two major models of value uncertainty in the optimal stopping literature: the secretary model, which assumes no prior knowledge, and the prophet inequality model, which assumes full information about value distributions. In…

Competition complexity formalizes a compelling intuition: rather than refining the mechanism, how much additional competition is sufficient for a simple mechanism to compete with an optimal one? We begin the study of this question in…

Assume that we observe a stochastic process $(X(t))_{t\in[-r,T]}$, which satisfies the linear stochastic delay differential equation \[ \mathrm{d} X(t) = \vartheta \int_{[-r,0]} X(t + u) \, a(\mathrm{d} u) \, \mathrm{d} t + \mathrm{d} W(t)…