In probability theory and related fields, a stochastic or random process is a mathematical object usually defined as a family of random variables. Many stochastic processes can be represented by time series. However, a stochastic process is by nature continuous while a time series is a set of observations indexed by integers. A stochastic process may involve several related random variables.
A Markov chain is a stochastic model describing a sequence of possible events in which the probability of each event depends only on the state attained in the previous event. A countably infinite sequence, in which the chain moves state at discrete time steps, gives a discrete-time Markov chain (DTMC). A continuous-time process is called a continuous-time Markov chain (CTMC). It is named after the Russian mathematician Andrey Markov.
Hidden Markov Model (HMM) is a statistical Markov model in which the system being modeled is assumed to be a Markov process – call it – with unobservable ("hidden") states. HMM assumes that there is another process whose behavior "depends" on . The goal is to learn about by observing . HMM stipulates that, for each time instance , the conditional probability distribution of given the history must not depend on .
A Bayesian network is a probabilistic graphical model that represents a set of variables and their conditional dependencies via a directed acyclic graph (DAG). Bayesian networks are ideal for taking an event that occurred and predicting the likelihood that any one of several possible known causes was the contributing factor. For example, a Bayesian network could represent the probabilistic relationships between diseases and symptoms. Given symptoms, the network can be used to compute the probabilities of the presence of various diseases.
In statistics, Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods comprise a class of algorithms for sampling from a probability distribution. By constructing a Markov chain that has the desired distribution as its equilibrium distribution, one can obtain a sample of the desired distribution by recording states from the chain. The more steps that are included, the more closely the distribution of the sample matches the actual desired distribution. Various algorithms exist for constructing chains, including the Metropolis–Hastings algorithm.
In probability theory and statistics, the term Markov property refers to the memoryless property of a stochastic process. It is named after the Russian mathematician Andrey Markov. The term strong Markov property is similar to the Markov property, except that the meaning of "present" is defined in terms of a random variable known as a stopping time.
A graphical model or probabilistic graphical model (PGM) or structured probabilistic model is a probabilistic model for which a graph expresses the conditional dependence structure between random variables. They are commonly used in probability theory, statistics—particularly Bayesian statistics—and machine learning.
In statistics, Gibbs sampling or a Gibbs sampler is a Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm for obtaining a sequence of observations which are approximated from a specified multivariate probability distribution, when direct sampling is difficult. This sequence can be used to approximate the joint distribution ; to approximate the marginal distribution of one of the variables, or some subset of the variables ; or to compute an integral. Typically, some of the variables correspond to observations whose values are known, and hence do not need to be sampled.
In physics and mathematics, a random field is a random function over an arbitrary domain. That is, it is a function that takes on a random value at each point (or some other domain). It is also sometimes thought of as a synonym for a stochastic process with some restriction on its index set. That is, by modern definitions, a random field is a generalization of a stochastic process where the underlying parameter need no longer be real or integer valued "time" but can instead take values that are multidimensional vectors or points on some manifold.
In electrical engineering, computer science, statistical computing and bioinformatics, the Baum–Welch algorithm is a special case of the EM algorithm used to find the unknown parameters of a hidden Markov model (HMM). It makes use of the forward-backward algorithm to compute the statistics for the expectation step.
In statistical classification, two main approaches are called the generative approach and the discriminative approach. These compute classifiers by different approaches, differing in the degree of statistical modelling. Terminology is inconsistent, but three major types can be distinguished, following Jebara (2004):
In the domain of physics and probability, a Markov random field, Markov network or undirected graphical model is a set of random variables having a Markov property described by an undirected graph. In other words, a random field is said to be a Markov random field if it satisfies Markov properties.
Pattern theory, formulated by Ulf Grenander, is a mathematical formalism to describe knowledge of the world as patterns. It differs from other approaches to artificial intelligence in that it does not begin by prescribing algorithms and machinery to recognize and classify patterns; rather, it prescribes a vocabulary to articulate and recast the pattern concepts in precise language. Broad in its mathematical coverage, Pattern Theory spans algebra and statistics, as well as local topological and global entropic properties.
Conditional random fields (CRFs) are a class of statistical modeling method often applied in pattern recognition and machine learning and used for structured prediction. Whereas a classifier predicts a label for a single sample without considering "neighboring" samples, a CRF can take context into account. To do so, the prediction is modeled as a graphical model, which implements dependencies between the predictions. What kind of graph is used depends on the application. For example, in natural language processing, linear chain CRFs are popular, which implement sequential dependencies in the predictions. In image processing the graph typically connects locations to nearby and/or similar locations to enforce that they receive similar predictions.
In probability and statistics, a Markov renewal process (MRP) is a random process that generalizes the notion of Markov jump processes. Other random processes like Markov chains, Poisson processes and renewal processes can be derived as special cases of MRP's.
In the mathematical theory of stochastic processes, variable-order Markov (VOM) models are an important class of models that extend the well known Markov chain models. In contrast to the Markov chain models, where each random variable in a sequence with a Markov property depends on a fixed number of random variables, in VOM models this number of conditioning random variables may vary based on the specific observed realization.
Structured prediction or structured (output) learning is an umbrella term for supervised machine learning techniques that involves predicting structured objects, rather than scalar discrete or real values.
In probability, statistics and related fields, a Poisson point process is a type of random mathematical object that consists of points randomly located on a mathematical space. The Poisson point process is often called simply the Poisson process, but it is also called a Poisson random measure, Poisson random point field or Poisson point field. This point process has convenient mathematical properties, which has led to it being frequently defined in Euclidean space and used as a mathematical model for seemingly random processes in numerous disciplines such as astronomy, biology, ecology, geology, seismology, physics, economics, image processing, and telecommunications.
Dependency networks (DNs) are graphical models, similar to Markov networks, wherein each vertex (node) corresponds to a random variable and each edge captures dependencies among variables. Unlike Bayesian networks, DNs may contain cycles. Each node is associated to a conditional probability table, which determines the realization of the random variable given its parents.
In network theory, collective classification is the simultaneous prediction of the labels for multiple objects, where each label is predicted using information about the object's observed features, the observed features and labels of its neighbors, and the unobserved labels of its neighbors. Collective classification problems are defined in terms of networks of random variables, where the network structure determines the relationship between the random variables. Inference is performed on multiple random variables simultaneously, typically by propagating information between nodes in the network to perform approximate inference. Approaches that use collective classification can make use of relational information when performing inference. Examples of collective classification include predicting attributes of individuals in a social network, classifying webpages in the World Wide Web, and inferring the research area of a paper in a scientific publication dataset.
