The classical condition for regularity of a Markov chain is extended to include semi-Markov chains. In addition, for any given semi-Markov chain, we find Markov chains which exhibit identical regularity properties. This is done either (i) by transforming the state space or, alternatively, (ii) by imposing conditions on the holding-time distributions. Brief consideration is given to the problem of extending the results to processes other than semi-Markov chains.

In this paper, a new approach is proposed to investigate Blackwell-type renewal theorems for weighted renewal functions systematically according to which of the tails of weighted renewal constants or the underlying distribution is asymptotically heavier. Some classical results are improved considerably.

We consider planar first-passage percolation and show that the time constant can be bounded by multiples of the first and second tertiles of the weight distribution. As a consequence, we obtain a counter-example to a problem proposed by Alm and Deijfen (2015).

Consider a Lamperti–Kiu Markov additive process $(J, \xi)$ on $\{+, -\}\times\mathbb R\cup \{-\infty\}$, where J is the modulating Markov chain component. First we study the finiteness of the exponential functional and then consider its moments and tail asymptotics under Cramér’s condition. In the strong subexponential case we determine the subexponential tails of the exponential functional under some further assumptions.

Consider a homogeneous Poisson point process of the Euclidean plane and its Voronoi tessellation. The present note discusses the properties of two stationary point processes associated with the latter and depending on a parameter $\theta$ . The first is the set of points that belong to some one-dimensional facet of the Voronoi tessellation and such that the angle with which they see the two nuclei defining the facet is $\theta$ . The main question of interest on this first point process is its intensity. The second point process is that of the intersections of the said tessellation with a straight line having a random orientation. Its intensity is well known. The intersection points almost surely belong to one-dimensional facets. The main question here concerns the Palm distribution of the angle with which the points of this second point process see the two nuclei associated with the facet. We will give answers to these two questions and briefly discuss their practical motivations. We also discuss natural extensions to three dimensions.

We analyze average-based distributed algorithms relying on simple and pairwise random interactions among a large and unknown number of anonymous agents. This allows the characterization of global properties emerging from these local interactions. Agents start with an initial integer value, and at each interaction keep the average integer part of both values as their new value. The convergence occurs when, with high probability, all the agents possess the same value, which means that they all know a property of the global system. Using a well-chosen stochastic coupling, we improve upon existing results by providing explicit and tight bounds on the convergence time. We apply these general results to both the proportion problem and the system size problem.

We consider a stochastic SIR (susceptible $\rightarrow$ infective $\rightarrow$ removed) model in which the infectious periods are modulated by a collection of independent and identically distributed Feller processes. Each infected individual is associated with one of these processes, the trajectories of which determine the duration of his infectious period, his contamination rate, and his type of removal (e.g. death or immunization). We use a martingale approach to derive the distribution of the final epidemic size and severity for this model and provide some general examples. Next, we focus on a single infected individual facing a given number of susceptibles, and we determine the distribution of his outcome (number of contaminations, severity, type of removal). Using a discrete-time formulation of the model, we show that this distribution also provides us with an alternative, more stable method to compute the final epidemic outcome distribution.

We show analogs of the classical arcsine theorem for the occupation time of a random walk in (−∞,0) in the case of a small positive drift. To study the asymptotic behavior of the total time spent in (−∞,0) we consider parametrized classes of random walks, where the convergence of the parameter to 0 implies the convergence of the drift to 0. We begin with shift families, generated by a centered random walk by adding to each step a shift constant a>0 and then letting a tend to 0. Then we study families of associated distributions. In all cases we arrive at the same limiting distribution, which is the distribution of the time spent below 0 of a standard Brownian motion with drift 1. For shift families this is explained by a functional limit theorem. Using fluctuation-theoretic formulae we derive the generating function of the occupation time in closed form, which provides an alternative approach. We also present a new form of the first arcsine law for the Brownian motion with drift.

The existence of moments of first downward passage times of a spectrally negative Lévy process is governed by the general dynamics of the Lévy process, i.e. whether it is drifting to $+\infty$ , $-\infty$ , or oscillating. Whenever the Lévy process drifts to $+\infty$ , we prove that the $\kappa$ th moment of the first passage time (conditioned to be finite) exists if and only if the $(\kappa+1)$ th moment of the Lévy jump measure exists. This generalizes a result shown earlier by Delbaen for Cramér–Lundberg risk processes. Whenever the Lévy process drifts to $-\infty$ , we prove that all moments of the first passage time exist, while for an oscillating Lévy process we derive conditions for non-existence of the moments, and in particular we show that no integer moments exist.

We prove that a stochastic process of pure coagulation has at any time t ≥ 0 a time-dependent Gibbs distribution if and only if the rates ψ(i, j) of single coagulations are of the form ψ(i; j) = if(j) + jf(i), where f is an arbitrary nonnegative function on the set of positive integers. We also obtain a recurrence relation for weights of these Gibbs distributions that allow us to derive the general form of the solution and the explicit solutions in three particular cases of the function f. For the three corresponding models, we study the probability of coagulation into one giant cluster by time t > 0.

This paper provides a simple proof for the fact that the hitting time to an infrequently visited subset for a one-dependent regenerative process converges weakly to an exponential distribution. Special cases are positive recurrent Harris chains and Harris processes. The paper further extends this class of limit theorems to ‘rewards’ that are cumulated to the hitting time of such a rare set.

We study a version of the stochastic control problem of minimizing the sum of running and controlling costs, where control opportunities are restricted to independent Poisson arrival times. Under a general setting driven by a general Lévy process, we show the optimality of a periodic barrier strategy, which moves the process upward to the barrier whenever it is observed to be below it. The convergence of the optimal solutions to those in the continuous-observation case is also shown.

We show that the supremum of the successive percentages of red balls in Pólya's urn model is almost surely rational, give the set of values that are taken with positive probability, and derive several exact distributional results for the all-time maximal percentage.

A single machine is available to process a collection of stochastic jobs. Processing is preemptive and so (for example) the machine is allowed to switch away from a job before completion, should that prove advantageous. The jobs are deteriorating in the sense that their processing requirements grow (at job-specific rates) as they await processing. This phenomenon might be expected to enhance the status of non-preemptive policies. The primary objective of the paper is to find conditions which are sufficient to ensure the existence of a permutation policy to minimise the expected makespan. We also derive results for a weighted flowtime criterion. Applications of such models to the control of queues and to communication systems have been cited by other authors.

In a separate paper (Davis [2]) the characteristic functional for a replacement process due to Gani (see Gani and Yeo [1]) was obtained explicitly. The purpose of the present note is to consider the product densities for this process.

We analyse several aspects of a class of simple counting processes that can emerge in some fields of applications where a change point occurs. In particular, under simple conditions we prove a significant inequality for the stochastic intensity.

In this note we adopt the notation and terminology of Kingman (1966) without further comment. For the general single server queue one has For the queueing systems GI/D/1 and D/G/1 we shall show that it is possible to make use of the special form of the service time and inter-arrival time distributions, respectively, to evaluate the right hand side of (1). A similar evaluation applies to the limiting distribution when it exists. The results obtained could also be obtained from those of Finch (1969) and Henderson and Finch (1970) by using suitable limiting arguments.

Let {ξn, n ≧1} be a sequence of independent real random variables, F denote the common distribution function of identically distributed random variables ξn, n ≧1 and let ξ1 have an arbitrary distribution. Define Xn+1 = k max(Xn, ξ n+1), Yn+ 1 = max(Yn, ξ n+1) – c, Un+1 = l min(Un, ξ n+1), Vn+1 = min(Vn, ξ n+1) + c, n ≧ 1, 0 < k < 1, l > 1, 0 < c < ∞, and X1 = Υ1= U1 = V1 = ξ1. We establish conditions under which the limit law of max(X1, · ··, Xn) coincides with that of max(ξ2, · ··, ξ n+1) when both are appropriately normed. A similar exercise is carried out for the extreme statistics max(Y1, · ··, Yn), min(U1,· ··, Un) and min(V1, · ··, Vn).

A spectrum of self-organizing rules including the move-to-front rule and the transposition rule are applied to the communication problem. The stationary distributions under these rules are obtained. Cost comparison between them is considered. In the special case of three paths, it is shown that the transposition rule always outperforms the move-to-front rule.