Homogeneous turbulence 2026-10-14
Homogeneous turbulence has velocity statistics unchanged by translating all observation points. Mean spatial divergences vanish when the moments exist and averaging commutes with derivatives. Homogeneity is distinct from isotropy: it does not require equal statistics in different directions.
Influence function Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
An influence function asks how much a population answer moves when an infinitesimal fraction of its probability distribution is relocated to a specified point. It distinguishes the unbounded response of the mean from the bounded response of the median and the Huber location estimator. The normal-location influence curves and finite contamination bias of normal location below make that difference quantitative.
Let be a real-valued statistical functional, a reference probability measure, and the Dirac measure concentrated at . Along the epsilon-contamination neighborhood path , define the right derivative
The name influence curve refers to the same object. The derivative is in the signed direction , so the calculation removes baseline mass as well as adding a Dirac measure. The definition is a limit for each fixed ; it does not automatically give a remainder uniform over arbitrarily distant .[ref]
The statistical functional must be defined on these contaminated probability measures, and the right derivative must exist and be finite. For a mean, a finite first absolute moment suffices. For a median, require a unique baseline median and a probability density function continuous and strictly positive there. For a smooth M-estimator, require an isolated population root, justified differentiation of its expected value, and a nonzero derivative with respect to the fitted parameter. These are specific conditions for the formulas below. Existence of the pointwise influence function alone proves neither an asymptotic linear representation nor pathwise differentiability of a statistical functional; each needs control of its own remainder and admissible statistical paths.
For the statistical functional , assuming , the contaminated mean is exactly
Thus the influence function of the mean is , and its gross-error sensitivity is infinite on an unbounded sample space. The linear approximation is exact here: any fixed positive contamination fraction allows an arbitrarily large change by moving far enough. No finite second moment is needed for this derivative, although a finite variance is needed for the usual central limit theorem for the sample mean.
For comparison, the influence function of the sample median is
when the median is unique and the probability density function is positive and continuous at . The sign function records which side of receives the contaminating mass. The influence function of a quantile supplies the short derivation. With the generalized-inverse quantile convention, contamination exactly at leaves the median at , giving derivative zero there. If is very small, this bounded influence function can still be large; if , the displayed formula is unavailable.
Internal intermittency 2026-10-14
Internal intermittency is the fluctuating concentration of gradients, transfer and viscous dissipation inside turbulent fluid. It is distinct from an interface between turbulent and non-turbulent regions intermittently passing an observer. Its scale dependence is reflected in non-Gaussian increments and coarse-grained viscous dissipation moments.
For independent identically distributed observations with finite fourth moment, the sample mean of their squares has sampling variance . Its jackknife variance estimator is exactly the displayed unbiased estimator, since its leave-one-out values differ from their average by . The conditional bootstrap variance of a sample mean is . Thus the two methods have a known finite-sample scaling difference, despite sharing the same large-sample target.
Jackknife bias correction Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
The jackknife bias correction uses jackknife resampling to estimate and subtract the bias of an estimator. Here denotes the original estimator, its version after deleting observation , and the mean of those versions. For sample size , define
The sign matters: a negative estimated bias increases the corrected value. The original estimator and all deletion versions must target the same estimand and use the same estimation rule at their respective sample sizes. The definition alone does not make an unbiased estimator.
For an exact worked example, take the empirical variance
On , the sample mean is and . Each deletion empirical variance is recomputed around its own deletion sample mean, with divisor , giving
For instance, deleting leaves , whose sample mean is and whose empirical variance is . The correction on the full statistical sample is
The same data thus give a jackknife variance estimator of for the sample mean, and a corrected empirical variance of ; these are different estimands.
Figure 1.
Two uses of the same deletions: sampling variance and jackknife bias correction
. The left panel plots contributions to the jackknife variance estimator of the sample mean, summing to . The right panel plots the five deletion empirical variances and their mean , then compares the original empirical variance with the corrected sample variance . Details.
The exact equality with the usual sample variance is not an accident of these numbers. For any data with , write . Removing changes this sum to , so
For independent and identically distributed random variables with finite second moment and population variance , the expectation is . Its bias is exactly ; jackknife bias correction removes it exactly in this example. Thus is an unbiased estimator of under these assumptions, including where each deletion empirical variance is zero.
More generally, suppose the bias has a regular expansion at both sample sizes and , with coefficients independent of :
Under independent and identically distributed sampling, each deletion estimator has the same expectation as . Hence the corrected bias is
The leading term cancels; the remaining bias need not vanish. The notation is big O notation. This argument presumes the expansion, rather than proving it for every statistic; the regularity conditions discussed for the jackknife variance estimator and statistical dependence still require care. Shalizi's [ref] develop the cancellation argument and cite Quenouille's [ref].
The jackknife variance estimator estimates the sampling variance of the full-data estimator, using the deletion estimates and their mean from jackknife resampling:
The square root is the estimated standard error. The factor multiplies the divisor- variance of the deletion estimates: those estimates vary less than estimates from new independent experiments because almost all their observations are shared. Ryan Tibshirani's [ref] give the same scaling in terms of the divisor- sample variance of the deletion estimates.
For the sample mean, this formula has an exact algebraic simplification. With denoting the usual sample variance,
and therefore
Under the independent and identically distributed assumption and a finite second moment, is an unbiased estimator of the population variance . Consequently is an unbiased estimator of the sample mean's sampling variance . The equality itself holds for any observed data with ; its sampling interpretation uses the stated assumptions.
For , the sum of squared deviations from the sample mean is , giving sample variance . The deletion sample means have squared deviations totaling , so
Here estimates the variance of individual observations, while estimates the sampling variance of their sample mean. These answer different questions.
For more general statistics, validity requires regularity beyond the deletion formula, such as a sufficiently smooth function of sample means with suitable moments. Ordinary delete-one jackknife resampling can fail for nonsmooth quantiles, including the median; see Larry Wasserman's [ref]. With statistical dependence, deleting individual observations need not reproduce the relevant sampling variance; the deletion scheme must reflect that statistical dependence. Shalizi's [ref] distinguish the basic independent and identically distributed case from extensions.
On a Polish space , probability measures with finite first moments satisfy
The supremum runs over functions with Lipschitz constant at most one. Fixing ensures integrability from the moment assumption.
Kernel for density estimation Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
A kernel for density estimation is an integrable function with unit integral. For an ordinary kernel density estimator that is itself a probability density function, take
Thus specifies the bump's shape and the smoothing bandwidth specifies its width. The factor preserves area: doubling the smoothing bandwidth doubles the width and halves the height. An even function is a common choice; when its absolute first moment is finite, its mean is zero. Symmetry is useful but is not required for normalization.
The Gaussian density kernel is the standard normal density, . Its rescaled translate is the normal probability density with mean and standard deviation . It is positive everywhere, whereas an Epanechnikov kernel has compact support. With the Gaussian density kernel, the smoothing bandwidth is a standard deviation, not a cutoff beyond which observations have no influence.
The broader convention also allows signed kernels of order ell, such as the flat-top kernel for density estimation, to cancel moments and reduce the bias of an estimator. Their unit integral still normalizes total area, but a resulting kernel density estimator can take negative values and need not be a probability density function. Nonnegativity is therefore an additional condition, not a consequence of unit integral.
In the inertial range, velocity increment statistics also become independent of kinematic viscosity. Combined with the Kolmogorov first similarity hypothesis, this gives by dimensional analysis. Signed integer moments and absolute noninteger moments must be distinguished; the signed third-order coefficient is negative in a forward energy cascade.
Laplace distribution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-18
The Laplace distribution, also called the double exponential distribution, is a location-scale family with probability density function
The location is its mean, median and mode; controls its spread. In the centred rate convention, the same law has and , giving . Keeping track of whether a parameter is a scale or its reciprocal prevents reversing the effect of increasing it. [ref]
The two halves of the probability density function are reflected exponential decay curves, each with total probability . Their meeting point has a sharp corner: the left and right derivatives are and . This finite peak is not a positive probability mass at . Indeed
so , just as for any absolutely continuous probability distribution.
Figure 1.
Laplace and normal densities and two-sided tails with the same mean and variance
. Details.
The figure compares a Laplace distribution with , against a normal distribution with mean zero and standard deviation : both have variance 2. The right panel uses a logarithmic scale for the two-sided tail probability . Its straight Laplace distribution curve comes from ; the normal distribution tail falls faster. Thus values far from the center can be more plausible under a Laplace distribution even after matching the variance. These are theoretical curves, not measured frequencies. The tails still have exponential decay; this is not a heavy-tailed distribution in the convention requiring every positive exponential moment to diverge.
Integrating either half of the probability density function gives the cumulative distribution function
In particular . The basic moments are
Thus the scale is the expected value of the absolute distance from the center, and is not the standard deviation. [ref] A short way to obtain the moments is to note that has an exponential distribution with rate : for . Integrating gives and ; the symmetric distribution gives the centered first moment zero.
A smooth velocity varying on a scale larger than contributes to a velocity increment. Higher powers produce mixed moments with smaller-scale increments. longitudinal structure functions therefore attenuate, but do not exactly filter out, large-scale strain and intensity modulation.
If is Gaussian with variance , normalization gives . Taking predicts . Its eventual negative high-order exponents show that this extrapolation cannot hold for arbitrarily large orders with finite uniform velocity moments.
Lyapunov moment inequality Created 2026-10-06 Updated 2026-10-14
The Lyapunov moment inequality says that higher positive absolute moments give no smaller absolute moment sizes on a probability space. For a real random variable and ,
allowing an infinite value. For the left expression is an Lp norm; below one it is a quasi-norm, so the usual triangle inequality terminology needs that distinction. The comparison uses a probability measure of total mass one; arbitrary unnormalized measure spaces need a factor depending on their total mass.
For a nonnegative count, the first moment size is its expected value, while the second is the square root of its second moment. Both ten-trial counts in second moment method have first moment size one. The independent count has second moment size , whereas the shared-outcome count has second moment size . The second moment distinguishes models with the same average because its square increases the influence of rare large counts.
More generally, for with a Bernoulli random variable of parameter ,
It rises from one at toward ten as . Replacing by a parameter gives , which decreases toward zero for a fixed positive exponent when , making the rare-event and large-exponent limits different questions. For a scaled Rademacher random variable taking values and two with equal probabilities, every absolute moment size is exactly two: increasing the exponent does not distinguish signs when the absolute value is constant.
Figure 1.
Lyapunov moment inequality reveals how higher moments emphasize large outcomes and when equality holds
. Left: the two original ten-trial models from second moment method have the same mean one, but different absolute moment sizes at exponents above one. The shared model has with . Right: equal masses at and two keep almost surely, giving equality for every pair of positive exponents. These are fully specified mathematical probability models. Details.
For finite , apply the reversed Jensen's inequality to the strictly concave function and the nonnegative random variable :
Taking the positive th root proves the claim. Equality in this finite case holds exactly when is constant almost surely. If the higher moment is infinite, the upper bound is infinite and remains valid. Exponent zero is excluded from the statement; logarithmic or geometric limiting summaries require separately stated conventions, especially when can vanish.
Markov's inequality 2026-10-14
For a nonnegative random variable and threshold , Markov's inequality gives
The useful case has finite expected value; an infinite right side gives no finite information. The bound also holds if is nonnegative almost surely. Combining it with the elementary bound one gives . Nonnegativity is essential: negative values could otherwise cancel the contribution of large positive values to the expected value.
The idea is an average budget. Every outcome where contributes at least times its probability to , and the other outcomes contribute nonnegative amounts. Formally, the indicator function gives ; taking the expected value proves the bound. [ref].
For example, let take , , , with respective probabilities , , , . Its expected value is . At , the tail probability is , while the bound is . At , the tail probability is , while the bound is . A different probability distribution with the same expected value, putting masses and at and , attains the bound exactly at .
Figure 1.
An average bounds how much probability can lie beyond a positive threshold
. Left: the stipulated four-point probability distribution has expected value . Right: its exact tail probability and the capped Markov's inequality bound. Filled markers include an atom at the threshold; open markers show the smaller value immediately after it. The highlighted threshold has actual probability and bound . Details.
Markov's inequality is useful when a moment is easy to compute but a full probability distribution is difficult to determine. A nonnegative count with expected value less than one must have some positive probability of being zero, giving the first moment method. Applying the same bound to a squared centered random variable gives Chebyshev's inequality. Applying it to an exponential function of a random variable gives an exponential Markov bound, which can exploit more than a single moment.
Maxwell speed distribution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
The Maxwell speed distribution is the probability density function for the magnitude . Unlike a signed velocity component, speed cannot be negative:
For , the probability of a speed in is , and . The density has units of inverse speed, so its height alone is not a probability. [ref]
All velocities with magnitudes from to occupy a thin spherical shell of volume in velocity space. The isotropy of the Maxwell-Boltzmann velocity distribution makes its density constant over each shell, giving for any fixed unit direction . A larger radius offers more directions and more volume. The increasing shell factor initially wins over the decreasing Boltzmann factor, so and the most probable speed is positive. This is the geometric reason that the peaks of the vector and speed densities disagree.
With the dimensionless quantity , every such gas has the same rescaled speed density:
For comparison, has the standard normal distribution density on the whole real line. The Maxwell speed distribution is neither the positive half of this curve nor the distribution of : it combines three components.
Figure 1.
One signed velocity component peaks at zero, while speed peaks above zero because of spherical shells
. Details.
The first two moments of the Maxwell speed distribution give the mean and root mean square:
Consequently the mean translational kinetic energy is , as required by the equipartition theorem. [ref] The mean speed weights fast particles more than the density peak does, and the root mean square weights them more strongly still.
Changing temperature or particle mass only changes . At fixed mass, four times the temperature doubles every characteristic speed; at fixed temperature, four times the mass halves them. A stretched density becomes lower so that its area stays one. For two species at the same temperature, equal mean translational kinetic energy therefore means different typical speeds.
Figure 2.
Fourfold temperature doubles the speed scale, while fourfold particle mass halves it
. Details.
For independent-error regression with a zero-mean error, bounded density paths must preserve both normalization and the first moment. Their score functions therefore satisfy two constraints. When , truncation followed by two small bounded moment corrections shows these scores are dense in the displayed closed subspace of a Hilbert space. By independence, they are orthogonal to every with . The same constraints apply to other paths only under regularity permitting differentiation of the first moment.
A method-of-moments estimator equates selected theoretical moments to corresponding empirical moment estimates and solves for the parameter. For a distribution with mean and variance , the first two raw moment equations give and . Existence, uniqueness and consistency require appropriate identifiability and moment assumptions; unbiased empirical moments do not make nonlinear parameter estimates unbiased. This statistical estimation procedure differs from the method of moments in probability for proving convergence in distribution.
Moment Created 2026-09-28 Updated 2026-10-14
The th raw moment of a random variable is when this expectation exists.
More generally, a moment is an integral weighted by a power of a coordinate against a measure or density; raw, central, and standardized moments are distinguished by the coordinate and normalization used.