arXiv subjects

Zhenhua Lin

Publications and source records attributed to Zhenhua Lin.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Neural Wasserstein Two-Sample Tests

The two-sample homogeneity testing problem is fundamental in statistics and becomes particularly challenging in high dimensions, where classical tests can suffer substantial power loss. We develop a learning-assisted procedure based on the projection 1-Wasserstein distance, which we call the neural Wasserstein test. The method is motivated by the observation that there often exists a low-dimensional projection under which the two high-dimensional distributions differ. In practice, we learn the projection directions via manifold optimization and a witness function using deep neural networks. To adapt to unknown projection dimensions and sparsity levels, we aggregate a collection of candidate statistics through a max-type construction, avoiding explicit tuning while potentially improving power. We establish the validity and consistency of the proposed test and prove a Berry--Esseen type bound for the Gaussian approximation. In particular, under the null hypothesis, the aggregated statistic converges to the absolute maximum of a standard Gaussian vector, yielding an asymptotically pivotal (distribution-free) calibration that bypasses resampling. Simulation studies and a real-data example demonstrate the strong finite-sample performance of the proposed method.

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arXiv2026

Multi-transport Distributional Regression

We study distribution-on-distribution regression problems in which a response distribution depends on multiple distributional predictors. Such settings arise naturally in applications where the outcome distribution is driven by several heterogeneous distributional sources, yet remain challenging due to the nonlinear geometry of the Wasserstein space. We propose an intrinsic regression framework that aggregates predictor-specific transported distributions through a weighted Fr\'echet mean in the Wasserstein space. The resulting model admits multiple distributional predictors, assigns interpretable weights quantifying their relative contributions, and defines a flexible regression operator that is invariant to auxiliary construction choices, such as the selection of a reference distribution. From a theoretical perspective, we establish identifiability of the induced regression operator and derive asymptotic guarantees for its estimation under a predictive Wasserstein semi-norm, which directly characterizes convergence of the composite prediction map. Extensive simulation studies and a real data application demonstrate the improved predictive performance and interpretability of the proposed approach compared with existing Wasserstein regression methods.

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arXiv2025

Toward an Asymptotic Efficiency Theory on Regular Parameter Manifolds

Asymptotic efficiency theory is one of the pillars in the foundations of modern mathematical statistics. Not only does it serve as a rigorous theoretical benchmark for evaluating statistical methods, but it also sheds light on how to develop and unify novel statistical procedures. For example, the calculus of influence functions has led to many important statistical breakthroughs in the past decades. Responding to the pressing challenge of analyzing increasingly complex datasets, particularly those with non-Euclidean/nonlinear structures, many novel statistical models and methods have been proposed in recent years. However, the existing efficiency theory is not always readily applicable to these cases, as the theory was developed, for the most part, under the often neglected premise that both the sample space and the parameter space are normed linear spaces. As a consequence, efficiency results outside normed linear spaces are quite rare and isolated, obtained on a case-by-case basis. This paper aims to develop a more unified asymptotic efficiency theory, allowing the sample space, the parameter space, or both to be Riemannian manifolds satisfying certain regularity conditions. We build a vocabulary that helps translate essential concepts in efficiency theory from normed linear spaces to Riemannian manifolds, such as (locally) regular estimators, differentiable functionals, etc. Efficiency bounds are established under conditions parallel to those for normed linear spaces. We also demonstrate the conceptual advantage of the new framework by applying it to two concrete examples in statistics: the population Frechet mean and the regression coefficient vector of Single-Index Models.

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arXiv2025

Balancing Interference and Correlation in Spatial Experimental Designs: A Causal Graph Cut Approach

This paper focuses on the design of spatial experiments to optimize the amount of information derived from the experimental data and enhance the accuracy of the resulting causal effect estimator. We propose a surrogate function for the mean squared error (MSE) of the estimator, which facilitates the use of classical graph cut algorithms to learn the optimal design. Our proposal offers three key advances: (1) it accommodates moderate to large spatial interference effects; (2) it adapts to different spatial covariance functions; (3) it is computationally efficient. Theoretical results and numerical experiments based on synthetic environments and a dispatch simulator that models a city-scale ridesharing market, further validate the effectiveness of our design. A python implementation of our method is available at https://github.com/Mamba413/CausalGraphCut.

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arXiv2025

Fairness-aware Bayes optimal functional classification

Algorithmic fairness has become a central topic in machine learning, and mitigating disparities across different subpopulations has emerged as a rapidly growing research area. In this paper, we systematically study the classification of functional data under fairness constraints, ensuring the disparity level of the classifier is controlled below a pre-specified threshold. We propose a unified framework for fairness-aware functional classification, tackling an infinite-dimensional functional space, addressing key challenges from the absence of density ratios and intractability of posterior probabilities, and discussing unique phenomena in functional classification. We further design a post-processing algorithm, Fair Functional Linear Discriminant Analysis classifier (Fair-FLDA), which targets at homoscedastic Gaussian processes and achieves fairness via group-wise thresholding. Under weak structural assumptions on eigenspace, theoretical guarantees on fairness and excess risk controls are established. As a byproduct, our results cover the excess risk control of the standard FLDA as a special case, which, to the best of our knowledge, is first time seen. Our theoretical findings are complemented by extensive numerical experiments on synthetic and real datasets, highlighting the practicality of our designed algorithm.

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arXiv2024

Transfer Learning Meets Functional Linear Regression: No Negative Transfer under Posterior Drift

Posterior drift refers to changes in the relationship between responses and covariates while the distributions of the covariates remain unchanged. In this work, we explore functional linear regression under posterior drift with transfer learning. Specifically, we investigate when and how auxiliary data can be leveraged to improve the estimation accuracy of the slope function in the target model when posterior drift occurs. We employ the approximated least square method together with a lasso penalty to construct an estimator that transfers beneficial knowledge from source data. Theoretical analysis indicates that our method avoids negative transfer under posterior drift, even when the contrast between slope functions is quite large. Specifically, the estimator is shown to perform at least as well as the classical estimator using only target data, and it enhances the learning of the target model when the source and target models are sufficiently similar. Furthermore, to address scenarios where covariate distributions may change, we propose an adaptive algorithm using aggregation techniques. This algorithm is robust against non-informative source samples and effectively prevents negative transfer. Simulation and real data examples are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

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arXiv2024

Optimal estimation in private distributed functional data analysis

We systematically investigate the preservation of differential privacy in functional data analysis, beginning with functional mean estimation and extending to varying coefficient model estimation. Our work introduces a distributed learning framework involving multiple servers, each responsible for collecting several sparsely observed functions. This hierarchical setup introduces a mixed notion of privacy. Within each function, user-level differential privacy is applied to $m$ discrete observations. At the server level, central differential privacy is deployed to account for the centralised nature of data collection. Across servers, only private information is exchanged, adhering to federated differential privacy constraints. To address this complex hierarchy, we employ minimax theory to reveal several fundamental phenomena: from sparse to dense functional data analysis, from user-level to central and federated differential privacy costs, and the intricate interplay between different regimes of functional data analysis and privacy preservation. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to rigorously examine functional data estimation under multiple privacy constraints. Our theoretical findings are complemented by efficient private algorithms and extensive numerical evidence, providing a comprehensive exploration of this challenging problem.

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arXiv2024

Stationarity of Manifold Time Series

In modern interdisciplinary research, manifold time series data have been garnering more attention. A critical question in analyzing such data is ``stationarity'', which reflects the underlying dynamic behavior and is crucial across various fields like cell biology, neuroscience and empirical finance. Yet, there has been an absence of a formal definition of stationarity that is tailored to manifold time series. This work bridges this gap by proposing the first definitions of first-order and second-order stationarity for manifold time series. Additionally, we develop novel statistical procedures to test the stationarity of manifold time series and study their asymptotic properties. Our methods account for the curved nature of manifolds, leading to a more intricate analysis than that in Euclidean space. The effectiveness of our methods is evaluated through numerical simulations and their practical merits are demonstrated through analyzing a cell-type proportion time series dataset from a paper recently published in Cell. The first-order stationarity test result aligns with the biological findings of this paper, while the second-order stationarity test provides numerical support for a critical assumption made therein.

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arXiv2024

Semi-supervised Fr\'echet Regression

This paper explores the field of semi-supervised Fr\'echet regression, driven by the significant costs associated with obtaining non-Euclidean labels. Methodologically, we propose two novel methods: semi-supervised NW Fr\'echet regression and semi-supervised kNN Fr\'echet regression, both based on graph distance acquired from all feature instances. These methods extend the scope of existing semi-supervised Euclidean regression methods. We establish their convergence rates with limited labeled data and large amounts of unlabeled data, taking into account the low-dimensional manifold structure of the feature space. Through comprehensive simulations across diverse settings and applications to real data, we demonstrate the superior performance of our methods over their supervised counterparts. This study addresses existing research gaps and paves the way for further exploration and advancements in the field of semi-supervised Fr\'echet regression.

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arXiv2023

Testing High-Dimensional Mediation Effect with Arbitrary Exposure-Mediator Coefficients

In response to the unique challenge created by high-dimensional mediators in mediation analysis, this paper presents a novel procedure for testing the nullity of the mediation effect in the presence of high-dimensional mediators. The procedure incorporates two distinct features. Firstly, the test remains valid under all cases of the composite null hypothesis, including the challenging scenario where both exposure-mediator and mediator-outcome coefficients are zero. Secondly, it does not impose structural assumptions on the exposure-mediator coefficients, thereby allowing for an arbitrarily strong exposure-mediator relationship. To the best of our knowledge, the proposed test is the first of its kind to provably possess these two features in high-dimensional mediation analysis. The validity and consistency of the proposed test are established, and its numerical performance is showcased through simulation studies. The application of the proposed test is demonstrated by examining the mediation effect of DNA methylation between smoking status and lung cancer development.

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arXiv2023

Binary Regression and Classification with Covariates in Metric Spaces

Inspired by logistic regression, we introduce a regression model for data tuples consisting of a binary response and a set of covariates residing in a metric space without vector structures. Based on the proposed model we also develop a binary classifier for metric-space valued data. We propose a maximum likelihood estimator for the metric-space valued regression coefficient in the model, and provide upper bounds on the estimation error under various metric entropy conditions that quantify complexity of the underlying metric space. Matching lower bounds are derived for the important metric spaces commonly seen in statistics, establishing optimality of the proposed estimator in such spaces. Similarly, an upper bound on the excess risk of the developed classifier is provided for general metric spaces. A finer upper bound and a matching lower bound, and thus optimality of the proposed classifier, are established for Riemannian manifolds. To the best of our knowledge, the proposed regression model and the above minimax bounds are the first of their kind for analyzing a binary response with covariates residing in general metric spaces. We also investigate the numerical performance of the proposed estimator and classifier via simulation studies, and illustrate their practical merits via an application to task-related fMRI data.

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arXiv2022

Optimal One-pass Nonparametric Estimation Under Memory Constraint

For nonparametric regression in the streaming setting, where data constantly flow in and require real-time analysis, a main challenge is that data are cleared from the computer system once processed due to limited computer memory and storage. We tackle the challenge by proposing a novel one-pass estimator based on penalized orthogonal basis expansions and developing a general framework to study the interplay between statistical efficiency and memory consumption of estimators. We show that, the proposed estimator is statistically optimal under memory constraint, and has asymptotically minimal memory footprints among all one-pass estimators of the same estimation quality. Numerical studies demonstrate that the proposed one-pass estimator is nearly as efficient as its non-streaming counterpart that has access to all historical data.

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arXiv2022

Intrinsic Riemannian Functional Data Analysis for Sparse Longitudinal Observations

A new framework is developed to intrinsically analyze sparsely observed Riemannian functional data. It features four innovative components: a frame-independent covariance function, a smooth vector bundle termed covariance vector bundle, a parallel transport and a smooth bundle metric on the covariance vector bundle. The introduced intrinsic covariance function links estimation of covariance structure to smoothing problems that involve raw covariance observations derived from sparsely observed Riemannian functional data, while the covariance vector bundle provides a rigorous mathematical foundation for formulating such smoothing problems. The parallel transport and the bundle metric together make it possible to measure fidelity of fit to the covariance function. They also play a critical role in quantifying the quality of estimators for the covariance function. As an illustration, based on the proposed framework, we develop a local linear smoothing estimator for the covariance function, analyze its theoretical properties, and provide numerical demonstration via simulated and real datasets. The intrinsic feature of the framework makes it applicable to not only Euclidean submanifolds but also manifolds without a canonical ambient space.

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arXiv2021

Hypothesis Testing for Functional Linear Models via Bootstrapping

Hypothesis testing for the slope function in functional linear regression is of both practical and theoretical interest. We develop a novel test for the nullity of the slope function, where testing the slope function is transformed into testing a high-dimensional vector based on functional principal component analysis. This transformation fully circumvents ill-posedness in functional linear regression, thereby enhancing numeric stability. The proposed method leverages the technique of bootstrapping max statistics and exploits the inherent variance decay property of functional data, improving the empirical power of tests especially when the sample size is limited or the signal is relatively weak. We establish validity and consistency of our proposed test when the functional principal components are derived from data. Moreover, we show that the test maintains its asymptotic validity and consistency, even when including \emph{all} empirical functional principal components in our test statistics. This sharply contrasts with the task of estimating the slope function, which requires a delicate choice of the number (at most in the order of $\sqrt n$) of functional principal components to ensure estimation consistency. This distinction highlights an interesting difference between estimation and statistical inference regarding the slope function in functional linear regression. To the best of our knowledge, the proposed test is the first of its kind to utilize all empirical functional principal components.

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arXiv2021

Total Variation Regularized Fréchet Regression for Metric-Space Valued Data

Non-Euclidean data that are indexed with a scalar predictor such as time are increasingly encountered in data applications, while statistical methodology and theory for such random objects are not well developed yet. To address the need for new methodology in this area, we develop a total variation regularization technique for nonparametric Fréchet regression, which refers to a regression setting where a response residing in a metric space is paired with a scalar predictor and the target is a conditional Fréchet mean. Specifically, we seek to approximate an unknown metric-space valued function by an estimator that minimizes the Fréchet version of least squares and at the same time has small total variation, appropriately defined for metric-space valued objects. We show that the resulting estimator is representable by a piece-wise constant function and establish the minimax convergence rate of the proposed estimator for metric data objects that reside in Hadamard spaces. We illustrate the numerical performance of the proposed method for both simulated and real data, including metric spaces of symmetric positive-definite matrices with the affine-invariant distance, of probability distributions on the real line with the Wasserstein distance, and of phylogenetic trees with the Billera--Holmes--Vogtmann metric.

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arXiv2021

Wasserstein Regression

The analysis of samples of random objects that do not lie in a vector space is gaining increasing attention in statistics. An important class of such object data is univariate probability measures defined on the real line. Adopting the Wasserstein metric, we develop a class of regression models for such data, where random distributions serve as predictors and the responses are either also distributions or scalars. To define this regression model, we utilize the geometry of tangent bundles of the space of random measures endowed with the Wasserstein metric for mapping distributions to tangent spaces. The proposed distribution-to-distribution regression model provides an extension of multivariate linear regression for Euclidean data and function-to-function regression for Hilbert space valued data in functional data analysis. In simulations, it performs better than an alternative transformation approach where one maps distributions to a Hilbert space through the log quantile density transformation and then applies traditional functional regression. We derive asymptotic rates of convergence for the estimator of the regression operator and for predicted distributions and also study an extension to autoregressive models for distribution-valued time series. The proposed methods are illustrated with data on human mortality and distributional time series of house prices.

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arXiv2021

Intrinsic Wasserstein Correlation Analysis

We develop a framework of canonical correlation analysis for distribution-valued functional data within the geometry of Wasserstein spaces. Specifically, we formulate an intrinsic concept of correlation between random distributions, propose estimation methods based on functional principal component analysis (FPCA) and Tikhonov regularization, respectively, for the correlation and its corresponding weight functions, and establish the minimax convergence rates of the estimators. The key idea is to extend the framework of tensor Hilbert spaces to distribution-valued functional data to overcome the challenging issue raised by nonlinearity of Wasserstein spaces. The finite-sample performance of the proposed estimators is illustrated via simulation studies, and the practical merit is demonstrated via a study on the association of distributions of brain activities between two brain regions.

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arXiv2021

High-dimensional MANOVA via Bootstrapping and its Application to Functional and Sparse Count Data

We propose a new approach to the problem of high-dimensional multivariate ANOVA via bootstrapping max statistics that involve the differences of sample mean vectors. The proposed method proceeds via the construction of simultaneous confidence regions for the differences of population mean vectors. It is suited to simultaneously test the equality of several pairs of mean vectors of potentially more than two populations. By exploiting the variance decay property that is a natural feature in relevant applications, we are able to provide dimension-free and nearly-parametric convergence rates for Gaussian approximation, bootstrap approximation, and the size of the test. We demonstrate the proposed approach with ANOVA problems for functional data and sparse count data. The proposed methodology is shown to work well in simulations and several real data applications.

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