Jinyuan Chang

MARGINAL EMPIRICAL LIKELIHOOD AND SURE INDEPENDENCE FEATURE SCREENING

We study a marginal empirical likelihood approach in scenarios when the number of variables grows exponentially with the sample size. The marginal empirical likelihood ratios as functions of the parameters of interest are systematically examined, and we find that the marginal empirical likelihood ratio evaluated at zero can be used to differentiate whether an explanatory variable is contributing to a response variable or not. Based on this finding, we propose a unified feature screening procedure for linear models and the generalized linear models. Different from most existing feature screening approaches that rely on the magnitudes of some marginal estimators to identify true signals, the proposed screening approach is capable of further incorporating the level of uncertainties of such estimators. Such a merit inherits the self-studentization property of the empirical likelihood approach, and extends the insights of existing feature screening methods. Moreover, we show that our screening approach is less restrictive to distributional assumptions, and can be conveniently adapted to be applied in a broad range of scenarios such as models specified using general moment conditions. Our theoretical results and extensive numerical examples by simulations and data analysis demonstrate the merits of the marginal empirical likelihood approach.

Local independence feature screening for nonparametric and semiparametric models by marginal empirical likelihood

We consider an independence feature screening technique for identifying explanatory variables that locally contribute to the response variable in high-dimensional regression analysis. Without requiring a specific parametric form of the underlying data model, our approach accommodates a wide spectrum of nonparametric and semiparametric model families. To detect the local contributions of explanatory variables, our approach constructs empirical likelihood locally in conjunction with marginal nonparametric regressions. Since our approach actually requires no estimation, it is advantageous in scenarios such as the single-index models where even specification and identification of a marginal model is an issue. By automatically incorporating the level of variation of the nonparametric regression and directly assessing the strength of data evidence supporting local contribution from each explanatory variable, our approach provides a unique perspective for solving feature screening problems. Theoretical analysis shows that our approach can handle data dimensionality growing exponentially with the sample size. With extensive theoretical illustrations and numerical examples, we show that the local independence screening approach performs promisingly.

Simulation-Based Hypothesis Testing of High Dimensional Means Under Covariance Heterogeneity

In this article, we study the problem of testing the mean vectors of high dimensional data in both one-sample and two-sample cases. The proposed testing procedures employ maximum-type statistics and the parametric bootstrap techniques to compute the critical values. Different from the existing tests that heavily rely on the structural conditions on the unknown covariance matrices, the proposed tests allow general covariance structures of the data and therefore enjoy wide scope of applicability in practice. To enhance powers of the tests against sparse alternatives, we further propose two-step procedures with a preliminary feature screening step. Theoretical properties of the proposed tests are investigated. Through extensive numerical experiments on synthetic data sets and an human acute lymphoblastic leukemia gene expression data set, we illustrate the performance of the new tests and how they may provide assistance on detecting disease-associated gene-sets. The proposed methods have been implemented in an R-package HDtest and are available on CRAN.

Comparing large covariance matrices under weak conditions on the dependence structure and its application to gene clustering

Comparing large covariance matrices has important applications in modern genomics, where scientists are often interested in understanding whether relationships (e.g., dependencies or co-regulations) among a large number of genes vary between different biological states. We propose a computationally fast procedure for testing the equality of two large covariance matrices when the dimensions of the covariance matrices are much larger than the sample sizes. A distinguishing feature of the new procedure is that it imposes no structural assumptions on the unknown covariance matrices. Hence, the test is robust with respect to various complex dependence structures that frequently arise in genomics. We prove that the proposed procedure is asymptotically valid under weak moment conditions. As an interesting application, we derive a new gene clustering algorithm which shares the same nice property of avoiding restrictive structural assumptions for high-dimensional genomics data. Using an asthma gene expression dataset, we illustrate how the new test helps compare the covariance matrices of the genes across different gene sets/pathways between the disease group and the control group, and how the gene clustering algorithm provides new insights on the way gene clustering patterns differ between the two groups. The proposed methods have been implemented in an R-package HDtest and are available on CRAN.

Double-bootstrap methods that use a single double-bootstrap simulation

We show that, when the double bootstrap is used to improve performance of bootstrap methods for bias correction, techniques based on using a single double-bootstrap sample for each single-bootstrap sample can produce third-order accuracy for much less computational expense than is required by conventional double-bootstrap methods. However, this improved level of performance is not available for the single double-bootstrap methods that have been suggested to construct confidence intervals or distribution estimators.

Principal component analysis for second-order stationary vector time series

We extend the principal component analysis (PCA) to second-order stationary vector time series in the sense that we seek for a contemporaneous linear transformation for a

Testing for high-dimensional white noise using maximum cross-correlations

p

Confidence regions for entries of a large precision matrix

-variate time series such that the transformed series is segmented into several lower-dimensional subseries, and those subseries are uncorrelated with each other both contemporaneously and serially. Therefore those lower-dimensional series can be analysed separately as far as the linear dynamic structure is concerned. Technically it boils down to an eigenanalysis for a positive definite matrix. When

A frequency domain analysis of the error distribution from noisy high-frequency data

p

High dimensional stochastic regression with latent factors, endogeneity and nonlinearity

is large, an additional step is required to perform a permutation in terms of either maximum cross-correlations or FDR based on multiple tests. The asymptotic theory is established for both fixed