Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio Astronomy

Image formation in radio astronomy is often posed as a problem of constructing a nonnegative function from sparse samples of its Fourier transform. We explore an alternative approach that reformulates the problem in terms of estimating the entries of a diagonal covariance matrix from Gaussian data....

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Aaron Lanterman
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2024-12-01
Series:Stats
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2571-905X/7/4/88
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1846102636407816192
author Aaron Lanterman
author_facet Aaron Lanterman
author_sort Aaron Lanterman
collection DOAJ
description Image formation in radio astronomy is often posed as a problem of constructing a nonnegative function from sparse samples of its Fourier transform. We explore an alternative approach that reformulates the problem in terms of estimating the entries of a diagonal covariance matrix from Gaussian data. Maximum-likelihood estimates of the covariance cannot be readily computed analytically; hence, we investigate an iterative algorithm originally proposed by Snyder, O’Sullivan, and Miller in the context of radar imaging. The resulting maximum-likelihood estimates tend to be unacceptably rough due to the ill-posed nature of the maximum-likelihood estimation of functions from limited data, so some kind of regularization is needed. We explore penalized likelihoods based on entropy functionals, a roughness penalty proposed by Silverman, and an information-theoretic formulation of Good’s roughness penalty crafted by O’Sullivan. We also investigate algorithm variations that perform a generic smoothing step at each iteration. The results illustrate that tuning parameters allow for a tradeoff between the noise and blurriness of the reconstruction.
format Article
id doaj-art-51888018d7ee40b58d8f47aa8037ee64
institution Kabale University
issn 2571-905X
language English
publishDate 2024-12-01
publisher MDPI AG
record_format Article
series Stats
spelling doaj-art-51888018d7ee40b58d8f47aa8037ee642024-12-27T14:54:45ZengMDPI AGStats2571-905X2024-12-01741496151210.3390/stats7040088Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio AstronomyAaron Lanterman0School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 777 Atlantic Drive, Atlanta, GA 30332, USAImage formation in radio astronomy is often posed as a problem of constructing a nonnegative function from sparse samples of its Fourier transform. We explore an alternative approach that reformulates the problem in terms of estimating the entries of a diagonal covariance matrix from Gaussian data. Maximum-likelihood estimates of the covariance cannot be readily computed analytically; hence, we investigate an iterative algorithm originally proposed by Snyder, O’Sullivan, and Miller in the context of radar imaging. The resulting maximum-likelihood estimates tend to be unacceptably rough due to the ill-posed nature of the maximum-likelihood estimation of functions from limited data, so some kind of regularization is needed. We explore penalized likelihoods based on entropy functionals, a roughness penalty proposed by Silverman, and an information-theoretic formulation of Good’s roughness penalty crafted by O’Sullivan. We also investigate algorithm variations that perform a generic smoothing step at each iteration. The results illustrate that tuning parameters allow for a tradeoff between the noise and blurriness of the reconstruction.https://www.mdpi.com/2571-905X/7/4/88astronomymaximum likelihoodregularization
spellingShingle Aaron Lanterman
Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio Astronomy
Stats
astronomy
maximum likelihood
regularization
title Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio Astronomy
title_full Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio Astronomy
title_fullStr Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio Astronomy
title_full_unstemmed Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio Astronomy
title_short Maximum Penalized-Likelihood Structured Covariance Estimation for Imaging Extended Objects, with Application to Radio Astronomy
title_sort maximum penalized likelihood structured covariance estimation for imaging extended objects with application to radio astronomy
topic astronomy
maximum likelihood
regularization
url https://www.mdpi.com/2571-905X/7/4/88
work_keys_str_mv AT aaronlanterman maximumpenalizedlikelihoodstructuredcovarianceestimationforimagingextendedobjectswithapplicationtoradioastronomy