Abstract

A factor graph is a bipartite graph that expresses how a "global" function of many variables factors into a product of "local" functions. Factor graphs subsume many other graphical models including Bayesian networks, Markov random fields, and Tanner graphs. Following one simple computational rule, the sum-product algorithm operates in factor graphs to compute---either exactly or approximately---various marginal functions by distributed message-passing in the graph. A wide variety of algorithms developed in artificial intelligence, signal processing, and digital communications can be derived as specific instances of the sum-product algorithm, including the forward/backward algorithm, the Viterbi algorithm, the iterative "turbo" decoding algorithm, Pearl's belief propagation algorithm for Bayesian networks, the Kalman filter, and certain fast Fourier transform algorithms.

Citations