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Lasso-type sparse regression and high-dimensional Gaussian graphical models

University of British Columbia

High-dimensional datasets, where the number of measured variables is larger than the sample size, are not uncommon in modern real-world applications such as functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) data. Conventional statistical signal processing tools and mathematical models could fail at handling those datasets. Therefore, developing statistically valid models and computationally efficient algorithms for high-dimensional situations are of great importance in tackling practical and scientific problems. This thesis mainly focuses on the following two issues: (1) recovery of sparse regression coefficients in linear systems; (2) estimation of high-dimensional covariance matrix and its inverse matrix, both subject to additional random noise. In the first part, we focus on the Lasso-type sparse linear regression. We propose two improved versions of the Lasso estimator when the signal-to-noise ratio is low: (i) to leverage adaptive robust loss functions; (ii) to adopt a fully Bayesian modeling framework. In solution (i), we propose a robust Lasso with convex combined loss function and study its asymptotic behaviors. We further extend the asymptotic analysis to the Huberized Lasso, which is shown to be consistent even if the noise distribution is Cauchy. In solution (ii), we propose a fully Bayesian Lasso by unifying discrete prior on model size and continuous prior on regression coefficients in a single modeling framework. Since the proposed Bayesian Lasso has variable model sizes, we propose a reversible-jump MCMC algorithm to obtain its numeric estimates. In the second part, we focus on the estimation of large covariance and precision matrices. In high-dimensional situations, the sample covariance is an inconsistent estimator. To address this concern, regularized estimation is needed. For the covariance matrix estimation, we propose a shrinkage-to-tapering estimator and show that it has attractive theoretic properties for estimating general and large covariance matrices. For the precision matrix estimation, we propose a computationally efficient algorithm that is based on the thresholding operator and Neumann series expansion. We prove that, the proposed estimator is consistent in several senses under the spectral norm. Moreover, we show that the proposed estimator is minimax in a class of precision matrices that are approximately inversely closed.

Text

2012-04-30

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/42271

Electrical and Computer Engineering

University of British Columbia

UBCV

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/