New graphical models for sequential data and the improved state estimations by data-conditioned driving noises

Abstract A prevalent problem in statistical signal processing, applied statistics, and time series analysis arises from the attempt to identify the hidden state of Markov process based on a set of available noisy observations. In the context of sequential data, filtering refers to the probability distribution of the underlying Markovian system given the measurements made at or before the time of the estimated state. In addition to the filtering, the smoothing distribution is obtained from incorporating measurements made after the time of the estimated state into the filtered solution. This work proposes a number of new filters and smoothers that, in contrast to the traditional schemes, systematically make use of the process noises to give rise to enhanced performances in addressing the state estimation problem. In doing so, our approaches for the resolution are characterized by the application of the graphical models; the graph-based framework not only provides a unified perspective on the existing filters and smoothers but leads us to design new algorithms in a consistent and comprehensible manner. Moreover, the graph models facilitate the implementation of the suggested algorithms through message passing on the graph.