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Foundations of Data Science

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f(x)<br />

m < 1<br />

m > 1<br />

p 0<br />

m = 1 and p 1 < 1<br />

q<br />

x<br />

Figure 4.10: Illustration <strong>of</strong> the root <strong>of</strong> equation f(x) = x in the interval [0,1).<br />

Let q be the probability that the branching process dies out. If there are i children<br />

in the first generation, then each <strong>of</strong> the i subtrees must die out and this occurs with<br />

probability q i . Thus, q equals the summation over all values <strong>of</strong> i <strong>of</strong> the product <strong>of</strong> the<br />

probability <strong>of</strong> i children times the probability that i subtrees will die out. This gives<br />

q = ∑ ∞<br />

i=0 p iq i . Thus, q is the root <strong>of</strong> x = ∑ ∞<br />

i=0 p ix i , that is x = f(x).<br />

This suggests focusing on roots <strong>of</strong> the equation f(x) = x in the interval [0,1]. The value<br />

∑<br />

x = 1 is always a root <strong>of</strong> the equation f (x) = x since f (1) = ∞ p i = 1. When is there a<br />

smaller nonnegative root? The derivative <strong>of</strong> f (x) at x = 1 is f ′ (1) = p 1 + 2p 2 + 3p 3 + · · · .<br />

Let m = f ′ (1). Thus, m is the expected number <strong>of</strong> children <strong>of</strong> a node. If m > 1, one<br />

might expect the tree to grow forever, since each node at time j is expected to have more<br />

than one child. But this does not imply that the probability <strong>of</strong> extinction is zero. In fact,<br />

if p 0 > 0, then with positive probability, the root will have no children and the process<br />

will become extinct right away. Recall that for G(n, d ), the expected number <strong>of</strong> children<br />

n<br />

is d, so the parameter m plays the role <strong>of</strong> d.<br />

If m < 1, then the slope <strong>of</strong> f (x) at x = 1 is less than one. This fact along with<br />

convexity <strong>of</strong> f (x) implies that f (x) > x for x in [0, 1) and there is no root <strong>of</strong> f(x) = x in<br />

the interval [0, 1).<br />

If m = 1 and p 1 < 1, then once again convexity implies that f(x) > x for x ∈ [0, 1)<br />

and there is no root <strong>of</strong> f(x) = x in the interval [0, 1). If m = 1 and p 1 = 1, then f(x) is<br />

the straight line f(x) = x.<br />

If m >1, then the slope <strong>of</strong> f (x) is greater than the slope <strong>of</strong> x at x = 1. This fact,<br />

along with convexity <strong>of</strong> f (x), implies f (x) = x has a unique root in [0,1). When p 0 = 0,<br />

the root is at x = 0.<br />

Let q be the smallest nonnegative root <strong>of</strong> the equation f(x) = x. For m < 1 and for<br />

i=0<br />

98

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