Generalized Parameter Lifting: Finer Abstractions for Parametric Markov Chains

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Heck, Linus, Quatmann, Tim, Spel, Jip, Katoen, Joost-Pieter, Junges, Sebastian
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Heck, Linus
Quatmann, Tim
Spel, Jip
Katoen, Joost-Pieter
Junges, Sebastian
author_facet Heck, Linus
Quatmann, Tim
Spel, Jip
Katoen, Joost-Pieter
Junges, Sebastian
contents Parametric Markov chains (pMCs) are Markov chains (MCs) with symbolic probabilities. A pMC encodes a family of MCs, where each member is obtained by replacing parameters with constants. The parameters allow encoding dependencies between transitions, which sets pMCs apart from interval MCs. The verification problem for pMCs asks whether each MC in the corresponding family satisfies a given temporal specification. The state-of-the-art approach for this problem is parameter lifting (PL) -- an abstraction-refinement loop that abstracts the pMC to a non-parametric model analyzed with standard probabilistic model checking techniques. This paper presents two key improvements to tackle the main limitations of PL. First, we introduce generalized parameter lifting (GPL) to lift various restrictive assumptions made by PL. Second, we present a big-step transformation algorithm that reduces parameter dependencies in pMCs and, therefore, results in tighter approximations. Experiments show that GPL is widely applicable and that the big-step transformation accelerates pMC verification by up to orders of magnitude.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2504_05965
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Generalized Parameter Lifting: Finer Abstractions for Parametric Markov Chains
Heck, Linus
Quatmann, Tim
Spel, Jip
Katoen, Joost-Pieter
Junges, Sebastian
Logic in Computer Science
Formal Languages and Automata Theory
Parametric Markov chains (pMCs) are Markov chains (MCs) with symbolic probabilities. A pMC encodes a family of MCs, where each member is obtained by replacing parameters with constants. The parameters allow encoding dependencies between transitions, which sets pMCs apart from interval MCs. The verification problem for pMCs asks whether each MC in the corresponding family satisfies a given temporal specification. The state-of-the-art approach for this problem is parameter lifting (PL) -- an abstraction-refinement loop that abstracts the pMC to a non-parametric model analyzed with standard probabilistic model checking techniques. This paper presents two key improvements to tackle the main limitations of PL. First, we introduce generalized parameter lifting (GPL) to lift various restrictive assumptions made by PL. Second, we present a big-step transformation algorithm that reduces parameter dependencies in pMCs and, therefore, results in tighter approximations. Experiments show that GPL is widely applicable and that the big-step transformation accelerates pMC verification by up to orders of magnitude.
title Generalized Parameter Lifting: Finer Abstractions for Parametric Markov Chains
topic Logic in Computer Science
Formal Languages and Automata Theory
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.05965