Examples of Markov Chains - A Center-biased Random Walk

A Center-biased Random Walk

Consider a random walk on the number line where, at each step, the position (call it x) may change by +1 (to the right) or -1 (to the left) with probabilities:

(where c is a constant greater than 0)


For example if the constant, c, equals 1, the probabilities of a move to the left at positions x = -2,-1,0,1,2 are given by respectively. The random walk has a centering effect that weakens as c increases.

Since the probabilities depend only on the current position (value of x) and not on any prior positions, this biased random walk satisfies the definition of a Markov chain.

Read more about this topic:  Examples Of Markov Chains

Famous quotes containing the words random and/or walk:

    We should stop looking to law to provide the final answer.... Law cannot save us from ourselves.... We have to go out and try to accomplish our goals and resolve disagreements by doing what we think is right. That energy and resourcefulness, not millions of legal cubicles, is what was great about America. Let judgment and personal conviction be important again.
    Philip K. Howard, U.S. lawyer. The Death of Common Sense: How Law Is Suffocating America, pp. 186-87, Random House (1994)

    The creations of a great writer are little more than the moods and passions of his own heart, given surnames and Christian names, and sent to walk the earth.
    William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)