Performance Bounds for Sparse Parametric Covariance Estimation in Gaussian Models

We consider estimation of a sparse parameter vector that determines the covariance matrix of a Gaussian random vector via a sparse expansion into known "basis matrices". Using the theory of reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces, we derive lower bounds on the variance of estimators with a given mean function. This includes unbiased estimation as a special case. We also present a numerical comparison of our lower bounds with the variance of two standard estimators (hard-thresholding estimator and maximum likelihood estimator)

The RKHS Approach to Minimum Variance Estimation Revisited: Variance Bounds, Sufficient Statistics, and Exponential Families

The mathematical theory of reproducing kernel Hilbert spaces (RKHS) provides powerful tools for minimum variance estimation (MVE) problems. Here, we extend the classical RKHS based analysis of MVE in several directions. We develop a geometric formulation of five known lower bounds on the estimator variance (Barankin bound, Cramer-Rao bound, constrained Cramer-Rao bound, Bhattacharyya bound, and Hammersley-Chapman-Robbins bound) in terms of orthogonal projections onto a subspace of the RKHS associated with a given MVE problem. We show that, under mild conditions, the Barankin bound (the tightest possible lower bound on the estimator variance) is a lower semicontinuous function of the parameter vector. We also show that the RKHS associated with an MVE problem remains unchanged if the observation is replaced by a sufficient statistic. Finally, for MVE problems conforming to an exponential family of distributions, we derive novel closed-form lower bound on the estimator variance and show that a reduction of the parameter set leaves the minimum achievable variance unchanged

An RKHS Approach to Estimation with Sparsity Constraints

The investigation of the effects of sparsity or sparsity constraints in signal processing problems has received considerable attention recently. Sparsity constraints refer to the a priori information that the object or signal of interest can be represented by using only few elements of a predefined dictionary. Within this thesis, sparsity refers to the fact that a vector to be estimated has only few nonzero entries. One specific field concerned with sparsity constraints has become popular under the name Compressed Sensing (CS). Within CS, the sparsity is exploited in order to perform (nearly) lossless compression. Moreover, this compression is carried out jointly or simultaneously with the process of sensing a physical quantity. In contrast to CS, one can alternatively use sparsity to enhance signal processing methods. Obviously, sparsity constraints can only improve the obtainable estimation performance since the constraints can be interpreted as an additional prior information about the unknown parameter vector which is to be estimated. Our main focus will be on this aspect of sparsity, i.e., we analyze how much we can gain in estimation performance due to the sparsity constraints.Comment: PHD Thesi