40,748 research outputs found
Solving Dynamic Discrete Choice Models Using Smoothing and Sieve Methods
We propose to combine smoothing, simulations and sieve approximations to
solve for either the integrated or expected value function in a general class
of dynamic discrete choice (DDC) models. We use importance sampling to
approximate the Bellman operators defining the two functions. The random
Bellman operators, and therefore also the corresponding solutions, are
generally non-smooth which is undesirable. To circumvent this issue, we
introduce a smoothed version of the random Bellman operator and solve for the
corresponding smoothed value function using sieve methods. We show that one can
avoid using sieves by generalizing and adapting the `self-approximating' method
of Rust (1997) to our setting. We provide an asymptotic theory for the
approximate solutions and show that they converge with root-N-rate, where
is number of Monte Carlo draws, towards Gaussian processes. We examine their
performance in practice through a set of numerical experiments and find that
both methods perform well with the sieve method being particularly attractive
in terms of computational speed and accuracy
Data Assimilation: A Mathematical Introduction
These notes provide a systematic mathematical treatment of the subject of
data assimilation
Evaluating Data Assimilation Algorithms
Data assimilation leads naturally to a Bayesian formulation in which the
posterior probability distribution of the system state, given the observations,
plays a central conceptual role. The aim of this paper is to use this Bayesian
posterior probability distribution as a gold standard against which to evaluate
various commonly used data assimilation algorithms.
A key aspect of geophysical data assimilation is the high dimensionality and
low predictability of the computational model. With this in mind, yet with the
goal of allowing an explicit and accurate computation of the posterior
distribution, we study the 2D Navier-Stokes equations in a periodic geometry.
We compute the posterior probability distribution by state-of-the-art
statistical sampling techniques. The commonly used algorithms that we evaluate
against this accurate gold standard, as quantified by comparing the relative
error in reproducing its moments, are 4DVAR and a variety of sequential
filtering approximations based on 3DVAR and on extended and ensemble Kalman
filters.
The primary conclusions are that: (i) with appropriate parameter choices,
approximate filters can perform well in reproducing the mean of the desired
probability distribution; (ii) however they typically perform poorly when
attempting to reproduce the covariance; (iii) this poor performance is
compounded by the need to modify the covariance, in order to induce stability.
Thus, whilst filters can be a useful tool in predicting mean behavior, they
should be viewed with caution as predictors of uncertainty. These conclusions
are intrinsic to the algorithms and will not change if the model complexity is
increased, for example by employing a smaller viscosity, or by using a detailed
NWP model
Using the generalized interpolation material point method for fluid-solid interactions induced by surface tension
This thesis is devoted to the development of new, Generalized Interpolation Material Point Method (GIMP)-based algorithms for handling surface tension and contact (wetting) in fluid-solid interaction (FSI) problems at small scales. In these problems, surface tension becomes so dominant that its influence on both fluids and solids must be considered. Since analytical solutions for most engineering problems are usually unavailable, numerical methods are needed to describe and predict complicated time-dependent states in the solid and fluid involved due to surface tension effects. Traditional computational methods for handling fluid-solid interactions may not be effective due to their weakness in solving large-deformation problems and the complicated coupling of two different types of computational frameworks: one for solid, and the other for fluid. On the contrary, GIMP, a mesh-free algorithm for solid mechanics problems, is numerically effective in handling problems involving large deformations and fracture. Here we extend the capability of GIMP to handle fluid dynamics problems with surface tension, and to develop a new contact algorithm to deal with the wetting boundary conditions that include the modeling of contact angle and slip near the triple points where the three phases -- fluid, solid, and vapor -- meet. The error of the new GIMP algorithm for FSI problems at small scales, as verified by various benchmark problems, generally falls within the 5% range. In this thesis, we have successfully extended the capability of GIMP for handling FSI problems under surface tension in a one-solver numerical framework, a unique and innovative approach.Chapter 1. Introduction -- Chapter 2. Using the generalized interpolation material point method for fluid dynamics at low reynolds numbers -- Chapter 3. On the modeling of surface tension and its applications by the generalized interpolation material point method -- Chapter 4. Using the generalized interpolation material point method for fluid-solid interactions induced by surface tension -- Chapter 5. Conclusions
Multi-patch discontinuous Galerkin isogeometric analysis for wave propagation: explicit time-stepping and efficient mass matrix inversion
We present a class of spline finite element methods for time-domain wave
propagation which are particularly amenable to explicit time-stepping. The
proposed methods utilize a discontinuous Galerkin discretization to enforce
continuity of the solution field across geometric patches in a multi-patch
setting, which yields a mass matrix with convenient block diagonal structure.
Over each patch, we show how to accurately and efficiently invert mass matrices
in the presence of curved geometries by using a weight-adjusted approximation
of the mass matrix inverse. This approximation restores a tensor product
structure while retaining provable high order accuracy and semi-discrete energy
stability. We also estimate the maximum stable timestep for spline-based finite
elements and show that the use of spline spaces result in less stringent CFL
restrictions than equivalent piecewise continuous or discontinuous finite
element spaces. Finally, we explore the use of optimal knot vectors based on L2
n-widths. We show how the use of optimal knot vectors can improve both
approximation properties and the maximum stable timestep, and present a simple
heuristic method for approximating optimal knot positions. Numerical
experiments confirm the accuracy and stability of the proposed methods
Fast Ensemble Smoothing
Smoothing is essential to many oceanographic, meteorological and hydrological
applications. The interval smoothing problem updates all desired states within
a time interval using all available observations. The fixed-lag smoothing
problem updates only a fixed number of states prior to the observation at
current time. The fixed-lag smoothing problem is, in general, thought to be
computationally faster than a fixed-interval smoother, and can be an
appropriate approximation for long interval-smoothing problems. In this paper,
we use an ensemble-based approach to fixed-interval and fixed-lag smoothing,
and synthesize two algorithms. The first algorithm produces a linear time
solution to the interval smoothing problem with a fixed factor, and the second
one produces a fixed-lag solution that is independent of the lag length.
Identical-twin experiments conducted with the Lorenz-95 model show that for lag
lengths approximately equal to the error doubling time, or for long intervals
the proposed methods can provide significant computational savings. These
results suggest that ensemble methods yield both fixed-interval and fixed-lag
smoothing solutions that cost little additional effort over filtering and model
propagation, in the sense that in practical ensemble application the additional
increment is a small fraction of either filtering or model propagation costs.
We also show that fixed-interval smoothing can perform as fast as fixed-lag
smoothing and may be advantageous when memory is not an issue
Data Assimilation by Conditioning on Future Observations
Conventional recursive filtering approaches, designed for quantifying the
state of an evolving uncertain dynamical system with intermittent observations,
use a sequence of (i) an uncertainty propagation step followed by (ii) a step
where the associated data is assimilated using Bayes' rule. In this paper we
switch the order of the steps to: (i) one step ahead data assimilation followed
by (ii) uncertainty propagation. This route leads to a class of filtering
algorithms named \emph{smoothing filters}. For a system driven by random noise,
our proposed methods require the probability distribution of the driving noise
after the assimilation to be biased by a nonzero mean. The system noise,
conditioned on future observations, in turn pushes forward the filtering
solution in time closer to the true state and indeed helps to find a more
accurate approximate solution for the state estimation problem
Reconstruction of cosmological initial conditions from galaxy redshift catalogues
We present and test a new method for the reconstruction of cosmological
initial conditions from a full-sky galaxy catalogue. This method, called
ZTRACE, is based on a self-consistent solution of the growing mode of
gravitational instabilities according to the Zel'dovich approximation and
higher order in Lagrangian perturbation theory. Given the evolved
redshift-space density field, smoothed on some scale, ZTRACE finds via an
iterative procedure, an approximation to the initial density field for any
given set of cosmological parameters; real-space densities and peculiar
velocities are also reconstructed. The method is tested by applying it to
N-body simulations of an Einstein-de Sitter and an open cold dark matter
universe. It is shown that errors in the estimate of the density contrast
dominate the noise of the reconstruction. As a consequence, the reconstruction
of real space density and peculiar velocity fields using non-linear algorithms
is little improved over those based on linear theory. The use of a
mass-preserving adaptive smoothing, equivalent to a smoothing in Lagrangian
space, allows an unbiased (although noisy) reconstruction of initial
conditions, as long as the (linearly extrapolated) density contrast does not
exceed unity. The probability distribution function of the initial conditions
is recovered to high precision, even for Gaussian smoothing scales of ~ 5
Mpc/h, except for the tail at delta >~ 1. This result is insensitive to the
assumptions of the background cosmology.Comment: 19 pages, MN style, 12 figures included, revised version. MNRAS, in
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