We prove that the frequencies of the oldest, second-oldest, third-oldest, … alleles in the stationary infinitely-many-neutral-alleles diffusion model are distributed as X 1, (1 − X 1)X 2, (1 − X 1)(1 − X 2)X 3, …, where X 1, X 2,X 3, … are independent beta (1, θ) random variables, θ being twice the mutation intensity; that is, the frequencies of age-ordered alleles have the so-called Griffiths–Engen–McCloskey, or GEM, distribution. In fact, two proofs are given, the first involving reversibility and the size-biased Poisson–Dirichlet distribution, and the second relying on a result of Donnelly and Tavaré relating their age-ordered sampling formula to the GEM distribution.

The dynamical behaviour of particles which undergo diffusion with annihilation is modelled by a parabolic (Fokker–Planck) equation. Fundamental, closed-form solutions of this equation, identified with transition densities of the underlying stochastic process, are calculated by utilizing specific methods of probability measures on functional spaces and evolution semigroups.

In this paper, we give an alternative derivation of Kendall's representation for symmetric transition functions which relies on the backward and/or forward integral recursions. The proof uses a lemma concerning approximation by finite sections (which is useful in its own right) and is similar to the original proof for birth and death processes by Lederman and Reuter. Finally, we obtain a general result guaranteeing the existence of representations of transition functions such as those obtained by Pruitt and Iglehart.

Electric water heating loads, in power systems, can be adequately modeled by Markov processes comprising a mix of continuous and discrete states. A physically-based characterization of the dynamic behavior of large aggregates of electric water heating loads is obtained by deriving the forward Kolmogorov equations associated with the individual hybrid-state processes. In addition, by focusing on the discrete part of the state, a Markov renewal viewpoint of the processes is developed. Both viewpoints are used to analyze and predict the transient and steady-state behavior of these loads, of great importance in load management applications.

It is shown how Markov chain theory can be exploited to study non-linear time series, the emphasis being on the classification into stationary and non-stationary models. A generalized h-step version of the Tweedie (1975), (1976) criteria is formulated, and applications are given to a number of non-linear models. New results are obtained, and known results are shown to emerge as special cases in both the scalar and vector case. A connection to stability theory is briefly discussed, and it is indicated how the Markov property can be utilized for estimation purposes.

The existence and properties of a general ARMA (p, q) process, whose autocovariances, up to lag p, and impulse coefficients, up to lag q, coincide with some given values, are shown. A closed-form solution is obtained. Based on this, the maximal entropy property for ARMA process and the relation and difference between ARMA maximal entropy approximation and extended Padé approximation are discussed. This method may be used for the design of digital filters and for ARMA spectral estimation.

In this paper we attempt to develop an axiomatic theory of binary structure functions with dependent components. This is an important problem, hitherto largely ignored. The concept of coherent structure in probability is introduced and studied. The relationship to the classical coherent structure is discussed. In the new concept the relevancy is defined through reliability of the system, while in the classical concept it is defined through the structure function.

The problem of finding optimal replacement strategies for certain classes of failure systems is considered. These systems can be repaired upon failure, but are stochastically deteriorating, i.e., the lengths of the operating intervals decrease in some sense, whereas the durations of the repairs increase. For several models of this type optimal replacement strategies are derived under natural assumptions on the reward and the cost structure.

We develop a performance modeling methodology for product-form circuit-switched networks. These networks allow for: arbitrary topology and link capacities; Poisson and finite population arrivals; multiple classes of calls, each class with a different route and bandwidth requirement; conference as well as point-to-point calls. The methodology is first applied to generalized tree networks, which consist of multiple access links feeding into a common link. Each access link may support multiple ‘long-distance' classes (requiring circuits only on the access link and on the common link) and multiple ‘local' classes (requiring circuits only on the access link). For generalized tree networks an efficient algorithm is given to determine the blocking probabilities. The methodology is then applied to hierarchical tree networks, where traffic is repeatedly merged in the direction of a root node.

We also establish a ‘Norton' theorem for product-form circuit-switched networks. This theorem implies that for any given calling class, the entire network can be replaced by an Erlang loss system with a state-dependent arrival rate, without modifying the equilibrium probabilities for the particular calling class.

We study a single-server queue in which the server takes a vacation whenever the system becomes empty. The service and vacation times and the arrival process are all assumed to be mutually independent. The successive service times and the vacation times each form independent, identically distributed sequences with general distributions. A new class of non-renewal arrival processes is introduced. As special cases, it includes the Markov-modulated Poisson process and the superposition of phase-type renewal processes.

Algorithmically tractable equations for the distributions of the waiting times at an arbitrary time and at arrivals, as well as for the queue length at an arbitrary time, at arrivals, and at departures are established. Some factorizations, which are known for the case of renewal input, are generalized to this new framework and new factorizations are obtained. The algorithmic implementation of these results is discussed.

This paper studies the standard single-server queue with unlimited waiting space and the first-in first-out service discipline, modified by having the server take random vacations. In the first model, there is a vacation each time the queue becomes empty, as occurs for high-priority customers with a non-preemptive priority service discipline. Approximations for both the transient and steady-state behavior are developed for the case of relatively long vacations by proving a heavy-traffic limit theorem. If the vacation times increase appropriately as the traffic intensity increases, the workload and queue-length processes converge in distribution to Brownian motion with a negative drift, modified to have a random jump up whenever it hits the origin. In the second model, vacations are generated exogenously. In this case, if both the vacation times and the times between vacations increase appropriately as the traffic intensity increases, then the limit process is reflecting Brownian motion, modified by the addition of an exogenous jump process. The steady-state distributions of these two limiting jump-diffusion processes have decomposition properties previously established for vacation queueing models, i.e., in each case the steady-state distribution is the convolution of two distributions, one of which is the exponential steady-state distribution of the reflecting Brownian motion obtained as the heavy-traffic limit without vacations.

This paper identifies a probability structure for queues that belong to the class of vacation systems operating according to Markov schedules, admitting a wide variety of server scheduling disciplines including most disciplines associated with those M/GI/1/L vacation systems reported in the literature. The conditions that define these schedules are identified, and it is shown that when these conditions are satisfied, queueing behavior is governed by an underlying Markov renewal/semi-regenerative structure. A simple example is examined (the M/GI/1 vacation system with limited batch service) to demonstrate the usefulness and generality of the underlying probability structure.

It is shown that a distribution with complete monotone derivative is geometrically infinitely divisible and that the class of distributions with complete monotone derivative is a proper subclass of the class of geometrically infinitely divisible distributions.

Limiting distribution results are obtained for the sufficient statistics of an asymmetric Ising model on a torus. Applications are discussed.

An urn contains m types of balls of unequal numbers. Let ni be the number of balls of type i, i = 1, 2, …, m. Balls are drawn with replacement until first duplication. In the case of finite memory of order k, the distribution of Ym,k, the number of drawings required, is discussed. Special cases are obtained.

Stochastic concavity of the output process with respect to buffer sizes is established in a series of ·/M/1/B queues with loss at the first node.

We consider a tandem queueing system with m stages and finite intermediate buffer storage spaces. Each stage has a single server and the service times are independent and exponentially distributed. There is an unlimited supply of customers in front of the first stage. For this system we show that the number of customers departing from each of the m stages during the time interval [0, t] for any t ≧ 0 is strongly stochastically increasing and concave in the buffer storage capacities. Consequently the throughput of this tandem queueing system is an increasing and concave function of the buffer storage capacities. We establish this result using a sample path recursion for the departure processes from the m stages of the tandem queueing system, that may be of independent interest. The concavity of the throughput is used along with the reversibility property of tandem queues to obtain the optimal buffer space allocation that maximizes the throughput for a three-stage tandem queue.

For an initially empty M/M/1 queue, it is shown that the transform of the expectation of the number of departures in the interval (0, t] is invariant under an interchange of arrival and service rates. However, in the GI/G/1 queue with an initial single customer, the corresponding transform does not have this symmetric property.