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An application of the Jordan canonical form to the epidemic problem

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 July 2016

Linda P. Gilbert*
Affiliation:
Louisiana Tech University
A. M. Johnson*
Affiliation:
University of Arkansas at Little Rock
*
Postal address: Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, LA 71272, U.S.A.
∗∗Postal address: Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, 33rd and University, Little Rock, AR 72204, U.S.A.

Abstract

The stochastic version of the simple epidemic is considered in this paper. A method which has computational advantages is developed for computing the probability distribution of the process. The method is based on the Jordan canonical form of the matrix representing the system of differential-difference equations for the simple epidemic. It is also shown that the method can be applied to the general epidemic as well as any other right-shift process.

Type
Research Papers
Copyright
Copyright © Applied Probability Trust 1980 

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