We formulate some simple conditions under which a Markov chain may be
approximated by the solution to a differential equation, with quantifiable
error probabilities. The role of a choice of coordinate functions for the
Markov chain is emphasised. The general theory is illustrated in three
examples: the classical stochastic epidemic, a population process model with
fast and slow variables, and core-finding algorithms for large random
hypergraphs.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/07-PS121 the Probability
Surveys (http://www.i-journals.org/ps/) by the Institute of Mathematical
Statistics (http://www.imstat.org