Paper List
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Translating Measures onto Mechanisms: The Cognitive Relevance of Higher-Order Information
This review addresses the core challenge of translating abstract higher-order information theory metrics (e.g., synergy, redundancy) into defensible, ...
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Emergent Bayesian Behaviour and Optimal Cue Combination in LLMs
This paper addresses the critical gap in understanding whether LLMs spontaneously develop human-like Bayesian strategies for processing uncertain info...
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Vessel Network Topology in Molecular Communication: Insights from Experiments and Theory
This work addresses the critical lack of experimentally validated channel models for molecular communication within complex vessel networks, which is ...
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Modulation of DNA rheology by a transcription factor that forms aging microgels
This work addresses the fundamental question of how the transcription factor NANOG, essential for embryonic stem cell pluripotency, physically regulat...
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Imperfect molecular detection renormalizes apparent kinetic rates in stochastic gene regulatory networks
This paper addresses the core challenge of distinguishing genuine stochastic dynamics of gene regulatory networks from artifacts introduced by imperfe...
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PanFoMa: A Lightweight Foundation Model and Benchmark for Pan-Cancer
This paper addresses the dual challenge of achieving computational efficiency without sacrificing accuracy in whole-transcriptome single-cell represen...
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Beyond Bayesian Inference: The Correlation Integral Likelihood Framework and Gradient Flow Methods for Deterministic Sampling
This paper addresses the core challenge of calibrating complex biological models (e.g., PDEs, agent-based models) with incomplete, noisy, or heterogen...
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Contrastive Deep Learning for Variant Detection in Wastewater Genomic Sequencing
This paper addresses the core challenge of detecting viral variants in wastewater sequencing data without reference genomes or labeled annotations, ov...
Realizing Common Random Numbers: Event-Keyed Hashing for Causally Valid Stochastic Models
Institute for Disease Modeling, Gates Foundation | Department of Epidemiology, University of North Carolina | Institute for Disease Modeling, Gates Foundation
30秒速读
IN SHORT: This paper addresses the critical problem that standard stateful PRNG implementations in agent-based models violate causal validity by making random draws execution-path-dependent, thereby breaking the fundamental assumption of common random numbers needed for valid counterfactual comparisons.
核心创新
- Methodology Identifies and formalizes the fundamental mismatch between scientific causal structure in ABMs and program-level causal structure induced by stateful PRNGs through the lens of Structural Causal Models (SCMs)
- Methodology Introduces the concept of 'execution invariance' as a necessary property for causally valid ABM counterfactuals, requiring that exogenous noise terms remain stable across intervention scenarios
- Methodology Proposes event-keyed random number generation combining counter-based PRNGs (Philox/Threefry) with event identifiers to decouple random draws from simulation execution order
主要结论
- Standard stateful PRNG practices violate the execution invariance required for valid SCM-style interventions, as demonstrated through formal analysis of the structural causal model framework
- Event-keyed hashing with counter-based PRNGs restores the stable event-indexed exogenous structure assumed by SCMs, enabling proper counterfactual comparisons with variance reduction benefits
- The proposed approach allows ABMs to function as valid structural causal models under interventions, maintaining the critical property that interventions change only structural equations while holding exogenous noise terms fixed
摘要: Agent-based models (ABMs) are widely used to estimate causal treatment effects via paired counterfactual simulation. A standard variance reduction technique is common random numbers (CRNs), which couples replicates across intervention scenarios by sharing the same random inputs. In practice, CRNs are implemented by reusing the same base seed, but this relies on a critical assumption: that the same draw index corresponds to the same modeled event across scenarios. Stateful pseudorandom number generators (PRNGs) violate this assumption whenever interventions alter the simulation's execution path, because any change in control flow shifts the draw index used for all downstream events. We argue that this execution-path-dependent draw indexing is not only a variance-reduction nuisance, but represents a fundamental mismatch between the scientific causal structure ABMs are intended to encode and the program-level causal structure induced by stateful PRNG implementations. Formalizing this through the lens of structural causal models (SCMs), we show that standard PRNG practices yield causally incoherent paired counterfactual comparisons even when the mechanistic specification is otherwise sound. We show that a remedy is to combine counter-based random number generators (e.g., Philox/Threefry) with event identifiers. This decouples random number generation from simulation execution order by making random draws explicit functions of the particular modeled event that called them, restoring the stable event-indexed exogenous structure assumed by SCMs.