A binary search scheme for determining all contaminated specimens

Fuente: arXiv
Salvato in:
Dettagli Bibliografici
Autore principale: Papanicolaou, Vassilis G.
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2020
Soggetti:
Accesso online:
Tags: Aggiungi Tag
Nessun Tag, puoi essere il primo ad aggiungerne!!
_version_ 1866909086397759488
author Papanicolaou, Vassilis G.
author_facet Papanicolaou, Vassilis G.
contents Specimens are collected from $N$ different sources. Each specimen has probability $p$ of being contaminated (e.g., in the case of an infectious disease, $p$ is the prevalence rate), independently of the other specimens. In many cases group testing is applicable, namely one can take small portions from several specimens, mix them together and test the mixture for contamination, so that if the test turns positive, then at least one of the samples in the mixture is contaminated. In this paper we give a detailed probabilistic analysis of a binary search scheme, we propose, for determining all contaminated specimens. More precisely, we study the number $T(N)$ of tests required in order to find all the contaminated specimens, if this search scheme is applied. We derive recursive and, in some cases, explicit formulas for the expectation, the variance, and the characteristic function of $T(N)$. Also, we determine the asymptotic behavior of the moments of $T(N)$ as $N \to \infty$ and from that we obtain the limiting distribution of $T(N)$ (appropriately normalized), which turns out to be normal.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2007_11910
institution arXiv
publishDate 2020
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A binary search scheme for determining all contaminated specimens
Papanicolaou, Vassilis G.
Probability
60C99, 60F99, 60E10, 62P10, 92C50
Specimens are collected from $N$ different sources. Each specimen has probability $p$ of being contaminated (e.g., in the case of an infectious disease, $p$ is the prevalence rate), independently of the other specimens. In many cases group testing is applicable, namely one can take small portions from several specimens, mix them together and test the mixture for contamination, so that if the test turns positive, then at least one of the samples in the mixture is contaminated. In this paper we give a detailed probabilistic analysis of a binary search scheme, we propose, for determining all contaminated specimens. More precisely, we study the number $T(N)$ of tests required in order to find all the contaminated specimens, if this search scheme is applied. We derive recursive and, in some cases, explicit formulas for the expectation, the variance, and the characteristic function of $T(N)$. Also, we determine the asymptotic behavior of the moments of $T(N)$ as $N \to \infty$ and from that we obtain the limiting distribution of $T(N)$ (appropriately normalized), which turns out to be normal.
title A binary search scheme for determining all contaminated specimens
topic Probability
60C99, 60F99, 60E10, 62P10, 92C50
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2007.11910