CDF Statistics
Committee
13 Jan 2006.
The note
"TRandom Pitfalls" added to the
modeling
section of the recommendations page. This note should
be read by all users of ROOT's random number class TRandom,
which is shown to be defective.
- Joel Heinrich, Pennsylvania (chair)
- John Conway, UC Davis
- Luc Demortier, Rockefeller
-
Chris Genovese, Carnegie Mellon University Statistics Department
- Tom Junk, Fermilab
- Louis Lyons, Imperial College London
- Giovanni Punzi, Pisa
-
Larry Wasserman, Carnegie Mellon University Statistics Department
- Daniel Whiteson, UC Irvine
- Weiming Yao, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab
Charge to the Committee
The mandate from the CDF Spokespersons
is as follows:
"The charge of the Statistics Committee
is to identify typical problems in statistical analysis of CDF
data and to propose solutions which conform to sound
statistical procedures. Examples of such problems are setting
limits, fitting to theoretical predictions and merging of
results from different analyses/experiments. The committee is
requested to document their recommendations in the form of CDF
notes and public Web pages, and present the proposals to the
CDF Scientific Council for approval."
The committee is requested to identify
the first set of problems to be treated by June 30 2000 and to
provide well documented recommendations for that set by January
2001. The particular problem of setting limits should be treated
on a shorter time scale to take advantage of recent information
from the CERN and Fermilab Limits Workshops."
Contacting the Committee
We encourage input from members of the CDF
collaboration. They should feel free to email the
Statistics Committee with any comments or suggestions they may
have. We also welcome their questions (no matter
how large or small) on statistical issues related to high energy
physics analyses.
There are a number of complex issues
that arise in the use of statistical inference to extract
information about physical important phenomena. The
recommendations documented in the links below range from links to
books and notes to discussion of the merits and known pitfalls of
various techniques. This information is organized along the lines
of flow of a typical analysis:
- Sample selection
- Data modeling and fitting
- Systematic Uncertainties
- Interpretation
CDF Notes on Statistical
Issues
Books on Statistics
- Louis Lyons, Statistics for Particle and Nuclear
Physicists Cambridge University Press, 1986, ISBN
0521379342. Errata
- Glen Cowan, Statistical Data Analysis, Oxford Univ.
Press, 1998, ISBN 0198501552
- B. P. Roe, Probability and Statistics in Experimental
Physics, Springer, 1992, ISBN 0387978496
- A.G. Frodesen, et al., Probability and statistics in
particle physics, Columbia University Press, 1979, ISBN
8200019063
- Frederick James, Statistical Methods in Experimental
Physics, 2nd ed, World Scientific, 2007, ISBN 9789812705273
- D. Sivia and J. Skilling, Data Analysis, A Bayesian Tutorial,
2nd ed., Oxford University Press, 2006, ISBN 9780198568322
- A. Gelman, Bayesian Data Analysis, CRC Press, 1995,
ISBN 0412039915
- R. J. Barlow, Statistics, J. Wiley, 1989, ISBN
0471922951
Conference Proceedings and Paper Collections
While almost all the papers located in the sites listed in this section
are of high quality, there are a few that are dubious.
Caveat Emptor.
- CERN
Confidence Limits Workshop, January 2000
- FNAL Confidence
Limits Workshop, March 2000
- Advanced
Statistical Methods in Particle Physics, Durham, March
2002
-
PHYSTAT2003: Statistical Problems in Particle Physics,
Astrophysics and Cosmology, SLAC, September 2003
-
PHYSTAT2005: Statistical Problems in Particle Physics,
Astrophysics and Cosmology, Oxford, September 2005
-
PHYSTAT-LHC: Workshop on Statistical Issues for LHC Physics,
CERN, June 2007
-
Statistics Section of Neutrino Unbound
- 2006 Banff Workshop
on Statistcal Inference Problems in High Energy Physics and Astronmy
- 2010 Banff Workshop
on Statistical Issues Relevant to Significance of Discovery Claims
- Statistics Mini Workshop
at CERN, Feb. 13-14, 2013
Other Statistical References