7,181 research outputs found
Approximation Complexity of Maximum A Posteriori Inference in Sum-Product Networks
We discuss the computational complexity of approximating maximum a posteriori
inference in sum-product networks. We first show NP-hardness in trees of height
two by a reduction from maximum independent set; this implies
non-approximability within a sublinear factor. We show that this is a tight
bound, as we can find an approximation within a linear factor in networks of
height two. We then show that, in trees of height three, it is NP-hard to
approximate the problem within a factor for any sublinear function
of the size of the input . Again, this bound is tight, as we prove that
the usual max-product algorithm finds (in any network) approximations within
factor for some constant . Last, we present a simple
algorithm, and show that it provably produces solutions at least as good as,
and potentially much better than, the max-product algorithm. We empirically
analyze the proposed algorithm against max-product using synthetic and
realistic networks.Comment: 18 page
MIMO Detection for High-Order QAM Based on a Gaussian Tree Approximation
This paper proposes a new detection algorithm for MIMO communication systems
employing high order QAM constellations. The factor graph that corresponds to
this problem is very loopy; in fact, it is a complete graph. Hence, a
straightforward application of the Belief Propagation (BP) algorithm yields
very poor results. Our algorithm is based on an optimal tree approximation of
the Gaussian density of the unconstrained linear system. The finite-set
constraint is then applied to obtain a loop-free discrete distribution. It is
shown that even though the approximation is not directly applied to the exact
discrete distribution, applying the BP algorithm to the loop-free factor graph
outperforms current methods in terms of both performance and complexity. The
improved performance of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated on the problem
of MIMO detection
Parametric Inference for Biological Sequence Analysis
One of the major successes in computational biology has been the unification,
using the graphical model formalism, of a multitude of algorithms for
annotating and comparing biological sequences. Graphical models that have been
applied towards these problems include hidden Markov models for annotation,
tree models for phylogenetics, and pair hidden Markov models for alignment. A
single algorithm, the sum-product algorithm, solves many of the inference
problems associated with different statistical models. This paper introduces
the \emph{polytope propagation algorithm} for computing the Newton polytope of
an observation from a graphical model. This algorithm is a geometric version of
the sum-product algorithm and is used to analyze the parametric behavior of
maximum a posteriori inference calculations for graphical models.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures. See also companion paper "Tropical Geometry of
Statistical Models" (q-bio.QM/0311009
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