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arXiv · 2303.02060

Spectral learning of Bernoulli linear dynamical systems models

Iris R. Stone·Yotam Sagiv·Il Memming Park·Jonathan W. Pillow
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Abstract

Latent linear dynamical systems with Bernoulli observations provide a powerful modeling framework for identifying the temporal dynamics underlying binary time series data, which arise in a variety of contexts such as binary decision-making and discrete stochastic processes (e.g., binned neural spike trains). Here we develop a spectral learning method for fast, efficient fitting of probit-Bernoulli latent linear dynamical system (LDS) models. Our approach extends traditional subspace identification methods to the Bernoulli setting via a transformation of the first and second sample moments. This results in a robust, fixed-cost estimator that avoids the hazards of local optima and the long computation time of iterative fitting procedures like the expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm. In regimes where data is limited or assumptions about the statistical structure of the data are not met, we demonstrate that the spectral estimate provides a good initialization for Laplace-EM fitting. Finally, we show that the estimator provides substantial benefits to real world settings by analyzing data from mice performing a sensory decision-making task.

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Iris R. Stone, Yotam Sagiv, Il Memming Park, Jonathan W. Pillow. 2023-07-26. Spectral learning of Bernoulli linear dynamical systems models. https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.02060

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