Efficiency measure,modelling and estimation in combined array designs

In off‐line quality control, the settings that minimize the variance of a quality characteristic are unknown and must be determined based on an estimated dual response model of mean and variance. The present paper proposes a direct measure of the efficiency of any given design‐estimation procedure for variance minimization. This not only facilitates the comparison of different design‐estimation procedures, but may also provide a guideline for choosing a better solution when the estimated dual response model suggests multiple solutions. Motivated by the analysis of an industrial experiment on spray painting, the present paper also applies a class of link functions to model process variances in off‐line quality control. For model fitting, a parametric distribution is employed in updating the variance estimates used in an iteratively weighted least squares procedure for mean estimation. In analysing combined array experiments, Engel and Huele (Technometrics, 1996; 39:365) used log‐link to model process variances and considered an iteratively weighted least squares leading to the pseudo‐likelihood estimates of variances as discussed in Carroll and Ruppert (Transformation and Weighting in Regression, Chapman & Hall: New York). Their method is a special case of the approach considered in this paper. It is seen for the spray paint data that the log‐link may not be satisfactory and the class of link functions considered here improves substantially the fit to process variances. This conclusion is reached with a suggested method of comparing ‘empirical variances’ with the ‘theoretical variances’ based on the assumed model. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

响应变量随机缺失下的半参变系数模型的均值估计

在响应变量随机缺失时,研究了半参数变系数模型响应变量均值的借补估计.首先利用完整个体估计模型中的参数与非参数部分,然后再用借补方法与加权借补方法估计响应变量的均值.最后求出了估计的渐近偏差与渐近方差,研究了所得到的估计的渐近性质,并进行模拟比较.     

Simultaneous kriging-based estimation and optimization of mean response

Robust optimization is typically based on repeated calls to a deterministic simulation program that aim at both propagating uncertainties and finding optimal design variables. Often in practice, the “simulator” is a computationally intensive software which makes the computational cost one of the principal obstacles to optimization in the presence of uncertainties. This article proposes a new efficient method for minimizing the mean of the objective function. The efficiency stems from the sampling criterion which simultaneously optimizes and propagates uncertainty in the model. Without loss of generality, simulation parameters are divided into two sets, the deterministic optimization variables and the random uncertain parameters. A kriging (Gaussian process regression) model of the simulator is built and a mean process is analytically derived from it. The proposed sampling criterion that yields both optimization and uncertain parameters is the one-step ahead minimum variance of the mean process at the maximizer of the expected improvement. The method is compared with Monte Carlo and kriging-based approaches on analytical test functions in two, four and six dimensions.     

A Level-Value Estimation Method and Stochastic Implementation for Global Optimization

In this paper, we propose a new method, namely the level-value estimation method, for finding global minimizer of continuous optimization problem. For this purpose, we define the variance function and the mean deviation function, both depend on a level value of the objective function to be minimized. These functions have some good properties when Newton’s method is used to solve a variance equation resulting by setting the variance function to zero. We prove that the largest root of the variance equation equals the global minimal value of the corresponding optimization problem. We also propose an implementable algorithm of the level-value estimation method where importance sampling is used to calculate integrals of the variance function and the mean deviation function. The main idea of the cross-entropy method is used to update the parameters of sample distribution at each iteration. The implementable level-value estimation method has been verified to satisfy the convergent conditions of the inexact Newton method for solving a single variable nonlinear equation. Thus, convergence is guaranteed. The numerical results indicate that the proposed method is applicable and efficient in solving global optimization problems.     

Locally adaptive hazard smoothing

Summary We consider nonparametric estimation of hazard functions and their derivatives under random censorship, based on kernel smoothing of the Nelson (1972) estimator. One critically important ingredient for smoothing methods is the choice of an appropriate bandwidth. Since local variance of these estimates depends on the point where the hazard function is estimated and the bandwidth determines the trade-off between local variance and local bias, data-based local bandwidth choice is proposed. A general principle for obtaining asymptotically efficient data-based local bandwiths, is obtained by means of weak convergence of a local bandwidth process to a Gaussian limit process. Several specific asymptotically efficient bandwidth estimators are discussed. We propose in particular an, asymptotically efficient method derived from direct pilot estimators of the hazard function and of the local mean squared error. This bandwidth choice method has practical advantages and is also of interest in the uncensored case as well as for density estimation.Research supported by UC Davis Faculty Research Grant and by Air Force grant AFOSR-89-0386Research supported by Air Force grant AFOSR-89-0386     

Error estimation properties of Gaussian process models in stochastic simulations

The theoretical relationship between the prediction variance of a Gaussian process model (GPM) and its mean square prediction error is well known. This relationship has been studied for the case when deterministic simulations are used in GPM, with application to design of computer experiments and metamodeling optimization. This article analyzes the error estimation of Gaussian process models when the simulated data observations contain measurement noise. In particular, this work focuses on the correlation between the GPM prediction variance and the distribution of prediction errors over multiple experimental designs, as a function of location in the input space. The results show that the error estimation properties of a Gaussian process model using stochastic simulations are preserved when the signal-to-noise ratio in the data is larger than 10, regardless of the number of training points used in the metamodel. Also, this article concludes that the distribution of prediction errors approaches a normal distribution with a variance equal to the GPM prediction variance, even in the presence of significant bias in the GPM predictions.     

Smoothing estimation of rate function for recurrent event data with informative censoring

This paper proposes kernel estimation of the occurrence rate function for recurrent event data with informative censoring. An informative censoring model is considered with assumptions made on the joint distribution of the recurrent event process and the censoring time without modeling the censoring distribution. Under the validity of the informative censoring model, we also show that an estimator based on the assumption of independent censoring becomes inappropriate and is generally asymptotically biased. To investigate the asymptotic properties of the proposed estimator, the explicit form of its asymptotic mean squared risk and the asymptotic normality are derived. Meanwhile, the empirical consistent smoothing estimator for the variance function of the estimator is suggested. The performance of the estimators are also studied through Monte Carlo simulations. An epidemiological example of intravenous drug user data is used to show the influence of informative censoring in the estimation of the occurrence rate functions for inpatient cares over time.     

On robust mean-variance portfolios

We derive closed-form portfolio rules for robust mean–variance portfolio optimization where the return vector is uncertain or the mean return vector is subject to estimation errors, both uncertainties being confined to an ellipsoidal uncertainty set. We consider different mean–variance formulations allowing short sales, and derive closed-form optimal portfolio rules in static and dynamic settings.     

Nonparametric variance function estimation with missing data

In this paper, a fixed design regression model where the errors follow a strictly stationary process is considered. In this model the conditional mean function and the conditional variance function are unknown curves. Correlated errors when observations are missing in the response variable are assumed. Four nonparametric estimators of the conditional variance function based on local polynomial fitting are proposed. Expressions of the asymptotic bias and variance of these estimators are obtained. A simulation study illustrates the behavior of the proposed estimators.     

A differential harmony search based hybrid interval type2 fuzzy EGARCH model for stock market volatility prediction

In this paper a new hybrid model integrating an interval type2 fuzzy logic system (IT2FLS) with a computationally efficient functional link artificial neural network (CEFLANN) and an Exponential Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (EGARCH) model has been proposed for accurate forecasting and modeling of financial data with changing variance over time. The proposed model denoted as IT2F-CE-EGARCH helps to enhance the ability of EGARCH model through a joint estimation of the important features of EGARCH like leverage effect, asymmetric shock by leverage effect with the secondary membership functions of interval type2 TSK FLS and the functional expansion and learning component of a CEFLANN. The secondary membership functions with upper and lower limits of IT2FLS provide a forecasting interval for handling more complicated uncertainties involved in volatility forecasting compared to type1 FLS. The performance of the proposed model has been observed with two membership functions i.e. Gaussian with fixed mean, uncertain variance and Gaussian with fixed variance and uncertain mean. The proposed model has also been compared with a few other fuzzy time series models and GARCH family models based on four performance metrics: MSFE, RMSFE, MAFE and Rel MAE. Again a differential harmony search (DHS) algorithm has been suggested for optimizing the parameters of all the fuzzy time series models. The results indicate that the proposed IT2F-CE-EGARCH model offers significant improvements in volatility forecasting performance in comparison with all other specified models over BSE Sensex and CNX Nifty dataset.     

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??How to solve the inference problem of candidate database web surveys is an urgent problem to be solved in the development of web survey. In order to solve this problem, the inference method of non-probability sampling based on superpopulation pseudo design and the combined sample is proposed. A superpopulation model is firstly built up to construct pseudo weights for a survey sample of the web candidate database. The estimator of the population mean is then computed according to the combined sample composed of the survey sample of the web candidate database and a probability sample. The variance estimator of the population mean estimator is lastly derived according to the variance estimation theory of the superpopulation model. The Bootstrap and Jackknife methods are also used to compute the variance estimator. And all these variance estimation methods are compared. The research results show that the population mean estimator based on superpopulation pseudo design and the combined sample is better, and has higher efficiency than the estimator only using the probability sample and the weighted estimator only using the survey sample of the web candidate database. The variance estimator computed by using the VM1, VM2 and VM3 method are relatively better.     

Research on Inference of Candidate Database Web Surveys Based on Superpopulation Pseudo Design and the Combined Sample

How to solve the inference problem of candidate database web surveys is an urgent problem to be solved in the development of web survey. In order to solve this problem, the inference method of non-probability sampling based on superpopulation pseudo design and the combined sample is proposed. A superpopulation model is firstly built up to construct pseudo weights for a survey sample of the web candidate database. The estimator of the population mean is then computed according to the combined sample composed of the survey sample of the web candidate database and a probability sample. The variance estimator of the population mean estimator is lastly derived according to the variance estimation theory of the superpopulation model. The Bootstrap and Jackknife methods are also used to compute the variance estimator. And all these variance estimation methods are compared. The research results show that the population mean estimator based on superpopulation pseudo design and the combined sample is better, and has higher efficiency than the estimator only using the probability sample and the weighted estimator only using the survey sample of the web candidate database. The variance estimator computed by using the VM1, VM2 and VM3 method are relatively better.     

Diseño óptimo robusto utilizando modelos Kriging: aplicación al diseño óptimo robusto de estructuras articuladas

Conventional methods addressing the robust design optimization problem of structures usually require high computational requirements due to the nesting of uncertainty quantification within the optimization process. In order to address such a problem, this work proposes a methodology, based on Kriging models, to efficiently assess the uncertainty quantification in the optimization process. The Kriging model approximates the structural performance both in the design domain and in the stochastic domain, which allows to decouple the uncertainty quantification process and the optimization process. In addition, an infill criterion based on the variance of the Kriging prediction is included to update the Kriging model towards the global Pareto front. Three numerical examples show the applicability and the accuracy of the proposed methodology. The results show that the proposed method is appropriate to solve the robust design optimization problem with reasonable accuracy and a considerably lower number of function calls than required by conventional methods.     

Semiparametric estimation of mean and variance functions for non-Gaussian data

Flexible modelling of the response variance in regression is interesting for understanding the causes of variability in the responses, and is crucial for efficient estimation and correct inference for mean parameters. In this paper we describe methods for mean and variance estimation where the responses are modelled using the double exponential family of distributions and mean and dispersion parameters are described as an additive function of predictors. The additive terms in the model are represented by penalized splines. A simple and unified computational methodology is presented for carrying out the calculations required for Bayesian inference in this class of models based on an adaptive Metropolis algorithm. Application of the adaptive Metropolis algorithm is fully automatic and does not require any kind of pretuning runs. The methodology presented provides flexible methods for modelling heterogeneous Gaussian data, as well as overdispersed and underdispersed count data. Performance is considered in a variety of examples involving real and simulated data sets.     

A generalized partially linear framework for variance functions

When model the heteroscedasticity in a broad class of partially linear models, we allow the variance function to be a partial linear model as well and the parameters in the variance function to be different from those in the mean function. We develop a two-step estimation procedure, where in the first step some initial estimates of the parameters in both the mean and variance functions are obtained and then in the second step the estimates are updated using the weights calculated based on the initial estimates. The resulting weighted estimators of the linear coefficients in both the mean and variance functions are shown to be asymptotically normal, more efficient than the initial un-weighted estimators, and most efficient in the sense of semiparametric efficiency for some special cases. Simulation experiments are conducted to examine the numerical performance of the proposed procedure, which is also applied to data from an air pollution study in Mexico City.     

基于JGLM-RM模型的动态稳健设计及其应用

根据动态稳健设计的基本思想和方法,结合联合广义线性模型(Joint Generalized linearmodel)和响应模型(Response model)各自的特点和优势,构建出基于JGLM-RM的动态稳健设计模型。利用新模型对具体工业案例进行了实证研究,结果表明新模型不仅能有效地区分具体噪声因子和潜在噪声因子对整个过程波动的影响,而且能够灵活地调节模型的截距和斜率。此外,新模型引入了均值和散度的联合广义线性模型因此能适应广泛的响应类型。     

Approximate and Widespread Pareto Solutions in the Structure-Control Design of Mechatronic Systems

The structure-control design approach of mechatronic systems requires a different design formulation where the mechanical structure and control system are simultaneously designed. Optimization problems are commonly stated to confront the structure-control design formulation. Nevertheless, these problems are often very complex with a highly nonlinear dependence between the design variables and performance functions. This fact has made the use of evolutionary algorithms, a feasible alternative to solve the highly nonlinear optimization problem; the method to find the best solution is an open issue in the structure-control design approach. Hence, this paper presents a mechanism to exhaustively exploit the solutions in the differential evolution (DE) algorithm in order to find more non-dominated solutions with uniformly distributed Pareto front and better trade-offs in the structure-control design framework. The proposed approach adopts an external population to retain the non-dominated solutions found during the evolutionary process and includes a mechanism to mutate the individuals in their corresponding external population region. As a study case, the structure-control design of a serial-parallel manipulator with its control system is stated as a dynamic optimization problem and is solved by using the proposed approach. A comparative analysis shows that the multi-objective exhaustive exploitation differential evolution obtained a superior performance in the structure-control design framework than a DE algorithm which did not consider the proposal. Hence, the resulting designs provide better trade-offs between the structure-control performance functions.     

Optimizing human activity patterns using global sensitivity analysis

Implementing realistic activity patterns for a population is crucial for modeling, for example, disease spread, supply and demand, and disaster response. Using the dynamic activity simulation engine, DASim, we generate schedules for a population that capture regular (e.g., working, eating, and sleeping) and irregular activities (e.g., shopping or going to the doctor). We use the sample entropy (SampEn) statistic to quantify a schedule’s regularity for a population. We show how to tune an activity’s regularity by adjusting SampEn, thereby making it possible to realistically design activities when creating a schedule. The tuning process sets up a computationally intractable high-dimensional optimization problem. To reduce the computational demand, we use Bayesian Gaussian process regression to compute global sensitivity indices and identify the parameters that have the greatest effect on the variance of SampEn. We use the harmony search (HS) global optimization algorithm to locate global optima. Our results show that HS combined with global sensitivity analysis can efficiently tune the SampEn statistic with few search iterations. We demonstrate how global sensitivity analysis can guide statistical emulation and global optimization algorithms to efficiently tune activities and generate realistic activity patterns. Though our tuning methods are applied to dynamic activity schedule generation, they are general and represent a significant step in the direction of automated tuning and optimization of high-dimensional computer simulations.     

Using a Volterra system model to analyze nonlinear response in video-packet transmission over IP networks

This paper presents a Volterra system-based nonlinear analysis of video-packet transmission over IP networks. With the Volterra system, which is applicable to the modeling of nonlinear dynamic systems from sets of input and output data, we applied a time-series analysis of measured data for network response evaluation. In a test-bed connected to the Internet, we measured two parameters: the time intervals between consecutive packets from a video server at the originating side, and the transmission time of packets between originating and terminating sides. We used these as input and output data for the Volterra system and confirmed that the relative error of this model changed with conditions of network systems, which suggested that the packet transmission process affected the degree of nonlinearity of the system. The proposed method can reproduce the time-series responses observed in video-packet transmission over the Internet, reflecting nonlinear dynamic behaviors such that the obtained results provided us with an effective depiction of network conditions at different times.