We consider a class of diffusion processes with finite-dimensional parameters and partially observed at discrete time instances. We propose a methodology to unbiasedly estimate the expectation of a given functional of the diffusion process conditional on parameters and data. When these unbiased estimators with appropriately chosen functionals are employed within an expectation-maximization algorithm or a stochastic gradient method, this enables statistical inference using the maximum likelihood or Bayesian framework. Compared to existing approaches, the use of our unbiased estimators allows one to remove any time-discretization bias and Markov chain Monte Carlo burn-in bias. Central to our methodology is a novel and natural combination of multilevel randomization schemes and unbiased Markov chain Monte Carlo methods, and the development of new couplings of multiple conditional particle filters. We establish under assumptions that our estimators are unbiased and have finite variance. We illustrate various aspects of our method on an Ornstein--Uhlenbeck model, a logistic diffusion model for population dynamics, and a neural network model for grid cells.

A recently proposed formulation of the stochastic planning and control problem as one of parameter estimation for suitable artificial statistical models has led to the adoption of inference algorithms for this notoriously hard problem. At the algorithmic level, the focus has been on developing Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithms. In this paper, we begin by making the crucial observation that the stochastic control problem can be reinterpreted as one of trans-dimensional inference. With this new interpretation, we are able to propose a novel reversible jump Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithm that is more efficient than its EM counterparts. Moreover, it enables us to implement full Bayesian policy search, without the need for gradients and with one single Markov chain. The new approach involves sampling directly from a distribution that is proportional to the reward and, consequently, performs better than classic simulations methods in situations where the reward is a rare event.

Continuous-time marked point processes appear in many areas of science and engineering including queuing theory, seismology, neuroscience and finance. In numerous applications, these point processes are unobserved but actually drive an observation process. Here, we are interested in optimal sequential Bayesian estimation of such partially observed point processes. This class of filtering problems is non-standard as there is typically no underlying Markov structure and the likelihood function relating the observations to the point process has a complex form. Hence, except in very specific cases it is impossible to solve them in closed-form. We develop an original trans-dimensional Sequential Monte Carlo method to address this class of problems. An application to partially observed queues is presented.