Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Estimation Of The Parameters In A Spatial Regressive-Autoregressive Model Using Ord's Eigenvalue Method, Sajib Mahmud Mahmud Tonmoy

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In this thesis, we study one of Ord's (1975) global spatial regression models.

Ord considered spatial regressive-autoregressive models to describe the interaction

between location and a response variable in the presence of several covariates. He also

developed a practical estimation method for the parameters of this regression model

using the eigenvalues of a weight matrix that captures the contiguity of locations.

We review the theoretical aspects of his estimation method and implement it in the

statistical package R.

We also implement Ord's methods on the Columbus, Ohio, crime data set from the

year 1980, which involves the crime rate of …

Fundamental Tradeoffs In Estimation Of Finite-State Hidden Markov Models, Justin Le

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Hidden Markov models (HMMs) constitute a broad and flexible class of statistical models that are widely used in studying processes that evolve over time and are only observable through the collection of noisy data. Two problems are essential to the use of HMMs: state estimation and parameter estimation. In state estimation, an algorithm estimates the sequence of states of the process that most likely generated a certain sequence of observations in the data. In parameter estimation, an algorithm computes the probability distributions that govern the time-evolution of states and the sampling of data. Although algorithms for the two problems are …

Bi-Directional Testing For Change Point Detection In Poisson Processes, Moinak Bhaduri

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Point processes often serve as a natural language to chronicle an event's temporal evolution, and significant changes in the flow, synonymous with non-stationarity, are usually triggered by assignable and frequently preventable causes, often heralding devastating ramifications. Examples include amplified restlessness of a volcano, increased frequencies of airplane crashes, hurricanes, mining mishaps, among others. Guessing these time points of changes, therefore, merits utmost care. Switching the way time traditionally propagates, we posit a new genre of bidirectional tests which, despite a frugal construct, prove to be exceedingly efficient in culling out non-stationarity under a wide spectrum of environments. A journey surveying …

Prostate Cancer Survival Among Hispanics: A Surveillance, Epidemiology, And End Results (Seer) Population-Based Cohort Study, David Rivas

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Hispanics are now the youngest, largest, and fastest growing minority group in the U.S. Prostate cancer (PC) is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in men and is the second-leading cause of cancer deaths among Hispanics. For the first time, we examined PC-specific survival among distinct Hispanic groups that include Mexicans, Cubans, Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, as well as Central and South Americans. We compared these groups to the main reference population in the U.S., non-Hispanic Whites (NHW), after adjustment for prognostic factor risk categories (prostate-specific antigen (PSA) level, Gleason score, and tumor stage), as well as sociodemographic covariates (e.g., health insurance, …

Golden Arm: A Probabilistic Study Of Dice Control In Craps, Donald R. Smith, Robert Scott Iii

UNLV Gaming Research & Review Journal

This paper calculates how much control a craps shooter must possess on dice outcomes to eliminate the house advantage. A golden arm is someone who has dice control (or a rhythm roller or dice influencer). There are various strategies for dice control in craps. We discuss several possibilities of dice control that would result in several different mathematical models of control. We do not assert whether dice control is possible or not (there is a lack of published evidence). However, after studying casino-legal methods described by dice-control advocates, we can see only one realistic mathematical model that describes the resulting …

Rock Paper Scissors And Evolutionary Game Theory, Christian Cordova, Rudolf Jovero, Evan Thomas

Math 365 Class Projects

In Rock Paper Scissors (RPS), three different "species" compete, but no single species has a dominating strategy. In evolutionary game theory, replicator equations model population densities over time. When a mutation is introduced, they are called "replicator-mutator" equations. Using the replicator-mutator equation in [1] we have shown how population density of three species change.