How to Become a Biostatistician: A study guide of Master's Degree in BioStatistics

Introduction: The aim of this study was to design of the study guide for the Master of BioStatistics program. Methods: In order to develop the study guide, the literature was reviewed and the first draft of the study guide was compiled using the opinions of experts. Then the face and content validity of the index was assessed from the perspective of the faculty members of Biostatistics across the country through electronic survey. Result: The present study guide includes a review of course titles, learning objectives and outcomes, educational prerequisites, a schedule of learning strategies, learning opportunities, assessment, and more resources for study. These titles are summarized in the present text. The face and content validity index were reported to be 87% and 92%, respectively. Conclusion: It seems that access to the study guide at the beginning of a master's degree in Biostatistics can put the learner on a better learning path, and the need to develop a unified study guide at the national level can be beneficial for the learners.

A Unified Study on L1 over L2 Minimization

<div>In this paper, we carry out a unified study for L_1 over L_2 sparsity promoting models, which are widely used in the regime of coherent dictionaries for recovering sparse nonnegative/arbitrary signal. First, we provide the exact recovery condition on both the constrained and the unconstrained models for a broad set of signals. Next, we prove the solution existence of these L_{1}/L_{2} models under the assumption that the null space of the measurement matrix satisfies the $s$-spherical section property. Then by deriving an analytical solution for the proximal operator of the L_{1} / L_{2} with nonnegative constraint, we develop a new alternating direction method of multipliers based method (ADMM$_p^+$) to solve the unconstrained model. We establish its global convergence to a d-stationary solution (sharpest stationary) and its local linear convergence under certain conditions. Numerical simulations on two specific applications confirm the superior of ADMM$_p^+$ over the state-of-the-art methods in sparse recovery. ADMM$_p^+$ reduces computational time by about $95\%\sim99\%$ while achieving a much higher accuracy compared to commonly used scaled gradient projection method for wavelength misalignment problem.</div>

A Unified Study on L1 over L2 Minimization

<div>In this paper, we carry out a unified study for L_1 over L_2 sparsity promoting models, which are widely used in the regime of coherent dictionaries for recovering sparse nonnegative/arbitrary signal. First, we provide the exact recovery condition on both the constrained and the unconstrained models for a broad set of signals. Next, we prove the solution existence of these L_{1}/L_{2} models under the assumption that the null space of the measurement matrix satisfies the $s$-spherical section property. Then by deriving an analytical solution for the proximal operator of the L_{1} / L_{2} with nonnegative constraint, we develop a new alternating direction method of multipliers based method (ADMM$_p^+$) to solve the unconstrained model. We establish its global convergence to a d-stationary solution (sharpest stationary) and its local linear convergence under certain conditions. Numerical simulations on two specific applications confirm the superior of ADMM$_p^+$ over the state-of-the-art methods in sparse recovery. ADMM$_p^+$ reduces computational time by about $95\%\sim99\%$ while achieving a much higher accuracy compared to commonly used scaled gradient projection method for wavelength misalignment problem.</div>

Identification of Linear and Bilinear Systems: A Unified Study

System identification problems are always challenging to address in applications that involve long impulse responses, especially in the framework of multichannel systems. In this context, the main goal of this review paper is to promote some recent developments that exploit decomposition-based approaches to multiple-input/single-output (MISO) system identification problems, which can be efficiently solved as combinations of low-dimension solutions. The basic idea is to reformulate such a high-dimension problem in the framework of bilinear forms, and to then take advantage of the Kronecker product decomposition and low-rank approximation of the spatiotemporal impulse response of the system. The validity of this approach is addressed in terms of the celebrated Wiener filter, by developing an iterative version with improved performance features (related to the accuracy and robustness of the solution). Simulation results support the main theoretical findings and indicate the appealing performance of these developments.

Directional Stochastic Orders with an Application to Financial Mathematics

Relevant integral stochastic orders share a common mathematical model, they are defined by generators which are made up of increasing functions on appropriate directions. Motivated by the aim to provide a unified study of those orders, we introduce a new class of integral stochastic orders whose generators are composed of functions that are increasing on the directions of a finite number of vectors. These orders will be called directional stochastic orders. Such stochastic orders are studied in depth. In that analysis, the conical combinations of vectors in those finite subsets play a relevant role. It is proved that directional stochastic orders are generated by non-stochastic pre-orders and the class of their preserving mappings. Geometrical characterizations of directional stochastic orders are developed. Those characterizations depend on the existence of non-trivial subspaces contained in the set of conical combinations. An application of directional stochastic orders to the field of financial mathematics is developed, namely, to the comparison of investments with random cash flows.

Galois action on homology of generalized Fermat Curves

The fundamental group of Fermat and generalized Fermat curves is computed. These curves are Galois ramified covers of the projective line with abelian Galois groups H. We provide a unified study of the action of both cover Galois group H and the absolute Galois group $\mathrm{Gal}(\bar{\mathbb{Q}}/\mathbb{Q})$ on the pro-$\ell$ homology of the curves in study. Also the relation to the pro-$\ell$ Burau representation is investigated.