Impact of Embedding View on Cross Mapping Convergence

Abstract

Convergent cross mapping (CCM) provides a powerful technique for exploring causal relationships in nonlinear coupled systems. The method relies on Takens' theorem exploiting that time delay embeddings of infinite length general observations of smooth nonlinear coupled systems are diffeomorphic to the original coupled state space attractor. However, for finite length data that is corrupted by quantization and noise, not every view of the embedding is equally useful at identifying the system dynamics. Classically, the heuristic of the first minimum of mutual information (MI) has been proposed as a means to select appropriate lags for time delay embedding methods. This criteria is sensitive to additive noise and known to fail for systems with monotonically decreasing MI. In this work, alternative heuristics on MI for identifying useful embedding views are explored. The impact of coordinate system and noise level on the identification of a useful time lag representative of the structure in chaotic data is studied. The impact of selecting the first minimum of MI relative to several alternate heuristics for the appropriate time lag in the context of of CCM method is then presented. Both simple dynamical systems as well as experimental data derived from observations of a Hall Effect Thruster plasma propulsion device are used. It is found that the shorter of the two global maxima of MI from signal pairs in a stretched discrete Legendre orthonormal coordinate system is a more robust option relative to the alternatives studied for selecting embedding lag for use with the CCM method. The choice identifies time lags commensurate with the brute force maximum bidirectional CCM correlation results generated. This enhanced performance results from a decreased sensitivity to noise and fluctuations in the estimates of MI when compared to lags derived from local criteria on MI.