The space-fractional Poisson process

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Abstract: In this paper we introduce the space-fractional Poisson process whose state probabilities pkalpha(t), t>0, alphain(0,1], are governed by the equations (mathrmd/mathrmdt)pk(t)=−lambdaalpha(1−B)pkalpha(t), where (1−B)alpha is the fractional difference operator found in the study of time series analysis. We explicitly obtain the distributions pkalpha(t), the probability generating functions Galpha(u,t), which are also expressed as distributions of the minimum of i.i.d. uniform random variables. The comparison with the time-fractional Poisson process is investigated and finally, we arrive at the more general space-time fractional Poisson process of which we give the explicit distribution.


For the probabilities \(p_{k}(t)=\operatorname{P}[N(t)=k]\) of a renewal process, let us consider the counting number \(N(t)\) as varying in space and \(t\) as usual denoting time. The classical homogeneous Poisson process is characterized by a system of difference-differential equations \(D_{t} p_{k} (t) = -\lambda (1 - B)p_{k} (t))\), \(\lambda > 0\), \(t \geq 0\), \(k = 1, 2, 3,\dots\), with \(D_t\) denoting first-order differentiation, \(B p_{k} = p_{k-1}\) (backward shift). Now, assume \(0 < \alpha \leq 1\), \(0 < nu \leq 1\). Replacing \(D_t\) by the Caputo time-derivative of order \(\nu\), one obtains the time-fractional Poisson process, whereas replacing \(\lambda (1-B)\) by \(\lambda^\alpha (1-B)^\alpha\) gives us the space-fractional Poisson process. Both replacements applied simultaneously lead to the space-time fractional Poisson process. The appropriate initial conditions are \(p_{0} (0)=1\), \(p_{k} (0)=0\) for \(k > 0\). The authors compare these processes to each other, present formulas and generating functions for the state probabilities \(p_{k} (t)\) and exhibit a relation of subordination for the space-fractional process involving the \(\gamma\)-stable subordinator, \( \gamma \in (0, 1]\).




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