একটি স্টেশনারি বিতরণ যেমন একটি বিতরণ π যে পদক্ষেপে রাজ্যের উপর বিতরণ ট হয় π, তারপর পদক্ষেপে রাজ্যের উপর বিতরণ কে + 1 হয় π। এটাই,
π= πপি।
A limiting distribution is such a distribution
π that no matter what the initial distribution is, the distribution over states converges to
π as the number of steps goes to infinity:
limk→∞π(0)Pk=π,
independent of
π(0).
For example, let us consider a Markov chain whose two states are the sides of a coin,
{heads,tails}. Each step consists of turning the coin upside down (with probability 1). Note that when we compute the state distributions, they are not conditional on previous steps, i.e., the guy who computes the probabilities does not see the coin. So, the transition matrix is
P=(0110).
If we first initialize the coin by flipping it randomly (
π(0)=(0.50.5)), then also all subsequent time steps follow this distribution. (If you flip a fair coin, and then turn it upside down, the probability of heads is still
0.5). Thus,
(0.50.5) is a stationary distribution for this Markov chain.
However, this chain does not have a limiting distribution: suppose we initialize the coin so that it is heads with probability 2/3. Then, as all subsequent states are determined by the initial state, after an even number of steps, the state is heads with probability 2/3 and after an odd number of steps the state is heads with probability 1/3. This holds no matter how many steps are taken, thus the distribution over states has no limit.
Now, let us modify the process so that at each step, one does not necessarily turn the coin. Instead, one throws a die, and if the result is 6, the coin is left as is. This Markov chain has transition matrix
P=(1/65/65/61/6).
Without going over the math, I will point out that this process will 'forget' the initial state due to randomly omitting the turn. After a huge amount of steps, the probability of heads will be close to
0.5, even if we know how the coin was initialized. Thus, this chain has the limiting distribution
(0.50.5).