Pini and Vantini (2017) introduced the interval-wise testing procedure which performs local inference for functional data defined on an interval domain, where the output is an adjusted p-value function that controls for type I errors. We extend this idea to a general setting where domain is a Riemannian manifolds. This requires new methodology such as how to define adjustment sets on product manifolds and how to approximate the test statistic when the domain has non-zero curvature. We propose to use permutation tests for inference and apply the procedure in three settings: a simulation on a "chameleon-shaped" manifold and two applications related to climate change where the manifolds are a complex subset of $S^2$ and $S^2 \times S^1$, respectively. We note the tradeoff between type I and type II errors: increasing the adjustment set reduces the type I error but also results in smaller areas of significance. However, some areas still remain significant even at maximal adjustment.
Given samples from two non-negative random variables, we propose a new class of nonparametric tests for the null hypothesis that one random variable dominates the other with respect to second-order stochastic dominance. These tests are based on the Lorenz P-P plot (LPP), which is the composition between the inverse unscaled Lorenz curve of one distribution and the unscaled Lorenz curve of the other. The LPP exceeds the identity function if and only if the dominance condition is violated, providing a rather simple method to construct test statistics, given by functionals defined over the difference between the identity and the LPP. We determine a stochastic upper bound for such test statistics under the null hypothesis, and derive its limit distribution, to be approximated via bootstrap procedures. We also establish the asymptotic validity of the tests under relatively mild conditions, allowing for both dependent and independent samples. Finally, finite sample properties are investigated through simulation studies.
Identification of nonlinear dynamical systems has been popularized by sparse identification of the nonlinear dynamics (SINDy) via the sequentially thresholded least squares (STLS) algorithm. Many extensions SINDy have emerged in the literature to deal with experimental data which are finite in length and noisy. Recently, the computationally intensive method of ensembling bootstrapped SINDy models (E-SINDy) was proposed for model identification, handling finite, highly noisy data. While the extensions of SINDy are numerous, their sparsity-promoting estimators occasionally provide sparse approximations of the dynamics as opposed to exact recovery. Furthermore, these estimators suffer under multicollinearity, e.g. the irrepresentable condition for the Lasso. In this paper, we demonstrate that the Trimmed Lasso for robust identification of models (TRIM) can provide exact recovery under more severe noise, finite data, and multicollinearity as opposed to E-SINDy. Additionally, the computational cost of TRIM is asymptotically equal to STLS since the sparsity parameter of the TRIM can be solved efficiently by convex solvers. We compare these methodologies on challenging nonlinear systems, specifically the Lorenz 63 system, the Bouc Wen oscillator from the nonlinear dynamics benchmark of No\"el and Schoukens, 2016, and a time delay system describing tool cutting dynamics. This study emphasizes the comparisons between STLS, reweighted $\ell_1$ minimization, and Trimmed Lasso in identification with respect to problems faced by practitioners: the problem of finite and noisy data, the performance of the sparse regression of when the library grows in dimension (multicollinearity), and automatic methods for choice of regularization parameters.
We propose an automated nonlinear model reduction and mesh adaptation framework for rapid and reliable solution of parameterized advection-dominated problems, with emphasis on compressible flows. The key features of our approach are threefold: (i) a metric-based mesh adaptation technique to generate an accurate mesh for a range of parameters, (ii) a general (i.e., independent of the underlying equations) registration procedure for the computation of a mapping $\Phi$ that tracks moving features of the solution field, and (iii) an hyper-reduced least-square Petrov-Galerkin reduced-order model for the rapid and reliable estimation of the mapped solution. We discuss a general paradigm -- which mimics the refinement loop considered in mesh adaptation -- to simultaneously construct the high-fidelity and the reduced-order approximations, and we discuss actionable strategies to accelerate the offline phase. We present extensive numerical investigations for a quasi-1D nozzle problem and for a two-dimensional inviscid flow past a Gaussian bump to display the many features of the methodology and to assess the performance for problems with discontinuous solutions.
Linear regression and classification models with repeated functional data are considered. For each statistical unit in the sample, a real-valued parameter is observed over time under different conditions. Two regression models based on fusion penalties are presented. The first one is a generalization of the variable fusion model based on the 1-nearest neighbor. The second one, called group fusion lasso, assumes some grouping structure of conditions and allows for homogeneity among the regression coefficient functions within groups. A finite sample numerical simulation and an application on EEG data are presented.
In this work, we address parametric non-stationary fluid dynamics problems within a model order reduction setting based on domain decomposition. Starting from the domain decomposition approach, we derive an optimal control problem, for which we present the convergence analysis. The snapshots for the high-fidelity model are obtained with the Finite Element discretisation, and the model order reduction is then proposed both in terms of time and physical parameters, with a standard POD-Galerkin projection. We test the proposed methodology on two fluid dynamics benchmarks: the non-stationary backward-facing step and lid-driven cavity flow. Finally, also in view of future works, we compare the intrusive POD--Galerkin approach with a non--intrusive approach based on Neural Networks.
The development of technologies for causal inference with the privacy preservation of distributed data has attracted considerable attention in recent years. To address this issue, we propose a data collaboration quasi-experiment (DC-QE) that enables causal inference from distributed data with privacy preservation. In our method, first, local parties construct dimensionality-reduced intermediate representations from the private data. Second, they share intermediate representations, instead of private data for privacy preservation. Third, propensity scores were estimated from the shared intermediate representations. Finally, the treatment effects were estimated from propensity scores. Our method can reduce both random errors and biases, whereas existing methods can only reduce random errors in the estimation of treatment effects. Through numerical experiments on both artificial and real-world data, we confirmed that our method can lead to better estimation results than individual analyses. Dimensionality-reduction loses some of the information in the private data and causes performance degradation. However, we observed that in the experiments, sharing intermediate representations with many parties to resolve the lack of subjects and covariates, our method improved performance enough to overcome the degradation caused by dimensionality-reduction. With the spread of our method, intermediate representations can be published as open data to help researchers find causalities and accumulated as a knowledge base.
This paper presents a novel approach for pointwise estimation of multivariate density functions on known domains of arbitrary dimensions using nonparametric local polynomial estimators. Our method is highly flexible, as it applies to both simple domains, such as open connected sets, and more complicated domains that are not star-shaped around the point of estimation. This enables us to handle domains with sharp concavities, holes, and local pinches, such as polynomial sectors. Additionally, we introduce a data-driven selection rule based on the general ideas of Goldenshluger and Lepski. Our results demonstrate that the local polynomial estimators are minimax under a $L^2$ risk across a wide range of H\"older-type functional classes. In the adaptive case, we provide oracle inequalities and explicitly determine the convergence rate of our statistical procedure. Simulations on polynomial sectors show that our oracle estimates outperform those of the most popular alternative method, found in the sparr package for the R software. Our statistical procedure is implemented in an online R package which is readily accessible.
We present Surjective Sequential Neural Likelihood (SSNL) estimation, a novel method for simulation-based inference in models where the evaluation of the likelihood function is not tractable and only a simulator that can generate synthetic data is available. SSNL fits a dimensionality-reducing surjective normalizing flow model and uses it as a surrogate likelihood function which allows for conventional Bayesian inference using either Markov chain Monte Carlo methods or variational inference. By embedding the data in a low-dimensional space, SSNL solves several issues previous likelihood-based methods had when applied to high-dimensional data sets that, for instance, contain non-informative data dimensions or lie along a lower-dimensional manifold. We evaluate SSNL on a wide variety of experiments and show that it generally outperforms contemporary methods used in simulation-based inference, for instance, on a challenging real-world example from astrophysics which models the magnetic field strength of the sun using a solar dynamo model.
Nonlinear extensions to the active subspaces method have brought remarkable results for dimension reduction in the parameter space and response surface design. We further develop a kernel-based nonlinear method. In particular we introduce it in a broader mathematical framework that contemplates also the reduction in parameter space of multivariate objective functions. The implementation is thoroughly discussed and tested on more challenging benchmarks than the ones already present in the literature, for which dimension reduction with active subspaces produces already good results. Finally, we show a whole pipeline for the design of response surfaces with the new methodology in the context of a parametric CFD application solved with the Discontinuous Galerkin method.
Developing an efficient computational scheme for high-dimensional Bayesian variable selection in generalised linear models and survival models has always been a challenging problem due to the absence of closed-form solutions for the marginal likelihood. The RJMCMC approach can be employed to samples model and coefficients jointly, but effective design of the transdimensional jumps of RJMCMC can be challenge, making it hard to implement. Alternatively, the marginal likelihood can be derived using data-augmentation scheme e.g. Polya-gamma data argumentation for logistic regression) or through other estimation methods. However, suitable data-augmentation schemes are not available for every generalised linear and survival models, and using estimations such as Laplace approximation or correlated pseudo-marginal to derive marginal likelihood within a locally informed proposal can be computationally expensive in the "large n, large p" settings. In this paper, three main contributions are presented. Firstly, we present an extended Point-wise implementation of Adaptive Random Neighbourhood Informed proposal (PARNI) to efficiently sample models directly from the marginal posterior distribution in both generalised linear models and survival models. Secondly, in the light of the approximate Laplace approximation, we also describe an efficient and accurate estimation method for the marginal likelihood which involves adaptive parameters. Additionally, we describe a new method to adapt the algorithmic tuning parameters of the PARNI proposal by replacing the Rao-Blackwellised estimates with the combination of a warm-start estimate and an ergodic average. We present numerous numerical results from simulated data and 8 high-dimensional gene fine mapping data-sets to showcase the efficiency of the novel PARNI proposal compared to the baseline add-delete-swap proposal.