{"id":1265,"date":"2022-04-05T19:42:37","date_gmt":"2022-04-05T19:42:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/meyn.ece.ufl.edu\/?page_id=1265"},"modified":"2026-04-14T09:51:19","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T14:51:19","slug":"stochastic-processes","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/courses\/stochastic-processes\/","title":{"rendered":"Stochastic Methods for Engineers II"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>An introduction to stochastic process theory with emphasis on applications to communications, control, signal processing and machine learning.\u00a0\u00a0 The course covers basic models, including Markov processes, and how they lead to algorithms for classification prediction, inference and model selection.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\">The course mainly follow&#8217;s Hajek&#8217;s excellent textbook.\u00a0 Markov chains and Monte-Carlo methods are based on chapters 7 and 8 of the <a href=\"https:\/\/meyn.ece.ufl.edu\/control-systems-and-reinforcement-learning\">new monograph<\/a><\/p>\n<table>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<h5>Outline<\/h5>\n<ol>\n<li class=\"p1\">Review of stochastic processes<\/li>\n<li>Convergence theory &amp; asymptotic statistics<\/li>\n<li class=\"p1\">Random processes &amp; applications<\/li>\n<li class=\"p1\">Inference for stochastic processes<\/li>\n<li class=\"p1\">Monte-Carlo methods (MCMC, stochastic approximation, particle filter, &#8230; as time permits)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/td>\n<td style=\"text-align: center\" valign=\"middle\"><a href=\"https:\/\/hajek.ece.illinois.edu\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-971 size-medium\" src=\"http:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2022\/04\/HajekBook.jpg\" alt=\"HajekBook\" width=\"207\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a><\/td>\n<td style=\"text-align: center\" valign=\"middle\"><a href=\"https:\/\/meyn.ece.ufl.edu\/publications\/current\/control-systems-and-reinforcement-learning\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-971 size-medium\" src=\"http:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2021\/08\/SunsetCoverNoBird-207x300.png\" alt=\"Book\" width=\"207\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2021\/08\/SunsetCoverNoBird-207x300.png 207w, https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2021\/08\/SunsetCoverNoBird-707x1024.png 707w, https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2021\/08\/SunsetCoverNoBird-768x1113.png 768w, https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2021\/08\/SunsetCoverNoBird-1060x1536.png 1060w, https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2021\/08\/SunsetCoverNoBird-1413x2048.png 1413w, https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2021\/08\/SunsetCoverNoBird-scaled.png 1767w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 207px) 100vw, 207px\" \/><\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p class=\"p1\">Most of the topics in this course are basic to any machine learning \/ statistical learning course.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>Applications to stochastic optimization and reinforcement learning are touched on throughout;<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>topics such as relative-entropy, mutual information, and hidden Markov models are relevant in every corner of communications, control and signal processing. Wikipedia will list applications ranging from \u2000nance to natural language processing.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Essential background<\/strong>: Probability theory and appreciation for mathematical foundations.\u00a0 Experience with Matlab or Python is also essential.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Notes for 2023:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li class=\"p1\">UF Statistics 2023 Winter Workshop: <a href=\"https:\/\/informatics.research.ufl.edu\/event\/statistics-annual-winter-workshop-2023\/\">Modern Computational Statistics<\/a>, January 13&amp;14, 2023. Amazing list of speakers!<\/li>\n<li>6th Workshop on <a href=\"https:\/\/meyn.ece.ufl.edu\/c3\/\">Cognition and Control in Complex Systems<\/a>,\u00a0 January 26&amp;27, 2023 (also on campus).<\/li>\n<li>No lecture the week of January 16-20.\u00a0 I will be at Cambridge U.K., presenting a tutorial lecture series for the semester program, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newton.ac.uk\/event\/ddew01\">The mathematical and statistical foundation of future data-driven engineering<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/671\/2022\/04\/StochasticMethods2_Poster_Spring2022-1.pdf\">Course information from Spring 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<h4><strong>More Resources<\/strong><\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>Ramon van Handel&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/web.math.princeton.edu\/~rvan\/\">lecture notes on HMMs<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An introduction to stochastic process theory with emphasis on applications to communications, control, signal processing and machine learning.\u00a0\u00a0 The course covers basic models, including Markov processes, and how they lead to algorithms for classification prediction, inference and model selection. The course mainly follow&#8217;s Hajek&#8217;s excellent textbook.\u00a0 Markov chains and Monte-Carlo methods are based on chapters [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1347,"featured_media":1637,"parent":711,"menu_order":1,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-templates\/page-section-nav.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"featured_post":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":["post-1265","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1347"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1265"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1265\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2903,"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1265\/revisions\/2903"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/711"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/faculty.eng.ufl.edu\/meyn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}