Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.

Linear parametric state-space models are a ubiquitous tool for analyzing neural time series data, providing a way to characterize the underlying brain dynamics with much greater statistical efficiency than non-parametric data analysis approaches. However, neural time series data are frequently time-...

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Main Authors: Mingjian He, Proloy Das, Gladia Hotan, Patrick L Purdon
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Public Library of Science (PLoS) 2023-08-01
Series:PLoS Computational Biology
Online Access:https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1011395&type=printable
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author Mingjian He
Proloy Das
Gladia Hotan
Patrick L Purdon
author_facet Mingjian He
Proloy Das
Gladia Hotan
Patrick L Purdon
author_sort Mingjian He
collection DOAJ
description Linear parametric state-space models are a ubiquitous tool for analyzing neural time series data, providing a way to characterize the underlying brain dynamics with much greater statistical efficiency than non-parametric data analysis approaches. However, neural time series data are frequently time-varying, exhibiting rapid changes in dynamics, with transient activity that is often the key feature of interest in the data. Stationary methods can be adapted to time-varying scenarios by employing fixed-duration windows under an assumption of quasi-stationarity. But time-varying dynamics can be explicitly modeled by switching state-space models, i.e., by using a pool of state-space models with different dynamics selected by a probabilistic switching process. Unfortunately, exact solutions for state inference and parameter learning with switching state-space models are intractable. Here we revisit a switching state-space model inference approach first proposed by Ghahramani and Hinton. We provide explicit derivations for solving the inference problem iteratively after applying a variational approximation on the joint posterior of the hidden states and the switching process. We introduce a novel initialization procedure using an efficient leave-one-out strategy to compare among candidate models, which significantly improves performance compared to the existing method that relies on deterministic annealing. We then utilize this state inference solution within a generalized expectation-maximization algorithm to estimate model parameters of the switching process and the linear state-space models with dynamics potentially shared among candidate models. We perform extensive simulations under different settings to benchmark performance against existing switching inference methods and further validate the robustness of our switching inference solution outside the generative switching model class. Finally, we demonstrate the utility of our method for sleep spindle detection in real recordings, showing how switching state-space models can be used to detect and extract transient spindles from human sleep electroencephalograms in an unsupervised manner.
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spelling doaj.art-802b3a36ebc24ad5b073ea73d51948302024-03-31T05:31:41ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS Computational Biology1553-734X1553-73582023-08-01198e101139510.1371/journal.pcbi.1011395Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.Mingjian HeProloy DasGladia HotanPatrick L PurdonLinear parametric state-space models are a ubiquitous tool for analyzing neural time series data, providing a way to characterize the underlying brain dynamics with much greater statistical efficiency than non-parametric data analysis approaches. However, neural time series data are frequently time-varying, exhibiting rapid changes in dynamics, with transient activity that is often the key feature of interest in the data. Stationary methods can be adapted to time-varying scenarios by employing fixed-duration windows under an assumption of quasi-stationarity. But time-varying dynamics can be explicitly modeled by switching state-space models, i.e., by using a pool of state-space models with different dynamics selected by a probabilistic switching process. Unfortunately, exact solutions for state inference and parameter learning with switching state-space models are intractable. Here we revisit a switching state-space model inference approach first proposed by Ghahramani and Hinton. We provide explicit derivations for solving the inference problem iteratively after applying a variational approximation on the joint posterior of the hidden states and the switching process. We introduce a novel initialization procedure using an efficient leave-one-out strategy to compare among candidate models, which significantly improves performance compared to the existing method that relies on deterministic annealing. We then utilize this state inference solution within a generalized expectation-maximization algorithm to estimate model parameters of the switching process and the linear state-space models with dynamics potentially shared among candidate models. We perform extensive simulations under different settings to benchmark performance against existing switching inference methods and further validate the robustness of our switching inference solution outside the generative switching model class. Finally, we demonstrate the utility of our method for sleep spindle detection in real recordings, showing how switching state-space models can be used to detect and extract transient spindles from human sleep electroencephalograms in an unsupervised manner.https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1011395&type=printable
spellingShingle Mingjian He
Proloy Das
Gladia Hotan
Patrick L Purdon
Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.
PLoS Computational Biology
title Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.
title_full Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.
title_fullStr Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.
title_full_unstemmed Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.
title_short Switching state-space modeling of neural signal dynamics.
title_sort switching state space modeling of neural signal dynamics
url https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1011395&type=printable
work_keys_str_mv AT mingjianhe switchingstatespacemodelingofneuralsignaldynamics
AT proloydas switchingstatespacemodelingofneuralsignaldynamics
AT gladiahotan switchingstatespacemodelingofneuralsignaldynamics
AT patricklpurdon switchingstatespacemodelingofneuralsignaldynamics