multitype branching processes offspring distribution maximum likelihood estimation expectation maximization stochastic context-free grammars inside-outside algorithm cell kinetics modelling
Issue Date:
2011
Publisher:
Institute of Mathematics and Informatics Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
Citation:
Pliska Studia Mathematica Bulgarica, Vol. 20, No 1, (2011), 45p-52p
Abstract:
Multitype branching processes (MTBP) have been proven to be very useful models in cell kinetics. A typical example is the process of oligodendrocyte generation in cell culture, which is regarded as two-type branching process. Usually, such a process is not observable in the sense of the whole tree, but only as the "generation" at given moment in time, which consist of the number of cells of every type. An EM-type algorithm is used to obtain a maximum likelihood (ML) estimation of the offspring distribution. The performance of the presented algorithm is assessed using simulated data.