# Evaluating and visualizing sampling quality

State sampling is a necessary step for any computational experiment, and the way sampling is carried out will influence the experiment’s results. This is the case for instance, for sensitivity analysis (i.e., the analysis of model output sensitivity to values of the input variables). The popular method of Sobol’ (Sobol’, 2001) relies on tailor-made sampling techniques that have been perfected through time (e.g., Joe and Kuo, 2008; Saltelli et al., 2010). Likewise, the method of Morris (Morris, 1991), less computationally demanding than Sobol’s (Herman et al., 2013) and used for screening (i.e., understanding which are the inputs that most influence outputs), relies on specific sampling techniques (Morris, 1991; Campolongo et al., 2007).

But what makes a good sample, and how can we understand the strengths and weaknesses of the sampling techniques (and also of the associated sensitivity techniques we are using) through quick visualization of some associated metrics?

This post aims to answer this question. It will first look at what makes a good sample using some examples from a sampling technique called latin hypercube sampling. Then it will show some handy visualization tools for quickly testing and visualizing a sample.

# What makes a good sample?

Intuitively, the first criterion for a good sample is how well it covers the space from which to sample. The difficulty though, is how we define “how well” it practice, and the implications that has.

Let us take an example. A quick and popular way to generate a sample that covers the space fairly well is latin hypercube sampling (LHS; McKay et al., 1979). This algorithm relies on the following steps for drawing N samples from a hypercube-shaped of dimension p.:

1) Divide each dimension of the space in N equiprobabilistic bins. If we want uniform sampling, each bin will have the same length. Number bins from 1 to N each dimension.

2) Randomly draw points such that you have exactly one in each bin in each dimension.

For instance, for 6 points in 2 dimensions, this is a possible sample (points are selected randomly in each square labelled A to F):

It is easy to see that by definition, LHS has a good space coverage when projected on each individual axis. But space coverage in multiple dimensions all depends on the luck of the draw. Indeed, this is also a perfectly valid LHS configuration:

In the above configuration, it is easy to see that on top of poor space coverage, correlation between the sampled values along both axes is also a huge issue. For instance, if output values are hugely dependent on values of input 1, there will be large variations of the output values as values of input 2 change, regardless of the real impact of input 2 on the output.

Therefore, there are two kinds of issues to look at. One is correlation between sampled values of the input variables. We’ll look at it first because it is pretty straightforward. Then we’ll look at space coverage metrics, which are more numerous, do not look exactly at the same things, and can be sometimes conflicting. In fact, it is illuminating to see that sample quality metrics sometimes trade-off with one another, and several authors have turned to multi-objective optimization to come up with Pareto-optimal sample designs (e.g., Cioppa and Lucas, 2007; De Rainville et al., 2012).

One can look at authors such as Sheikholeslami and Razavi (2017) who summarize similar sets of variables. The goal there is not to write a summary of summaries but rather to give a sense that there is a relationship between which indicators of sampling quality matter, which sampling strategy to use, and what we want to do.

In what follows we note $x_{k,i}$ the kth  sampled value of input variable i, with $1\leq k \leq N$ and $1\leq i \leq p$.

### Correlation

Sample correlation is usually measured through the Pearson statistic. For inputs variables i and j among the p input variables, we note $x_{k,i}$ and $x_{k,j}$ the values of these variables i and j in sample k $(1\leq k \leq N)$ have:

$\rho_{ij} = \frac{\sum_{k=1}^N (x_{k,i}-\bar{x}_i)(x_{k,j}-\bar{x}_j)}{\sqrt{\sum_{k=1}^N (x_{k,i}-\bar{x}_i)^2 \sum_{k=1}^N (x_{k,j}-\bar{x}_j)^2}}$

In the above equation, ${\bar{x}_i}$  and ${\bar{x}_j}$ are the average sampled values of inputs i and j .

Then, the indicator of sample quality looks at the maximal level of correlation across all variables:

$\rho_{\max} = \max_{1\leq i \leq j \leq N} |\rho_{ij}|$

This definition relies on the remark that $\rho_{ij} = \rho_{ji}$.

### Space Coverage

There are different measures of space coverage.

We are best equipped to visualize space coverage via 1D or 2D projections of a sample. In 1D a measure of space coverage is by dividing each dimension in N equiprobable bins, and count the fraction of bins that have at least a point. Since N is the sample size, this measure is maximized when there is exactly one point in each bin — it is a measure that LHS maximizes.

Other measures of space coverage consider all dimension at once. A straightforward measure of space filling is the minimum Euclidean distance between two sampled points X in the generated ensemble:

$D = \min_{1\leq k \leq m \leq N} \left\{ d(\textbf{X}^k, \textbf{X}^m) \right\}$

Other indicators measure discrepancy which is a concept closely related to space coverage. In simple terms, a low discrepancy means that when we look at a subset of a sampled input space, its volume is roughly proportional to the number of points that are in it. In other words, there is no large subset with relatively few sampled points, and there is no small subset with a relatively large density of sampled points. A low discrepancy is desirable and in fact, Sobol’ sequences that form the basis of the Sobol’ sensitivity analysis method, are meant to minimize discrepancy.

# Sample visualization

The figures that follow can be easily reproduced by cloning a little repository SampleVis I put together, and by entering on the command line python readme.py &amp;&gt; output.txt. That Python routine can be used with both latin hypercube and Sobol’ sampling (using the SAlib sampling tool; SAlib is a Python library developed primarily by Jon Herman and Will Usher, and which is extensively discussed in this blog.)

In what follows I give examples using a random draw of latin hypercube sampling with 100 members and 7 sampled variables.

### Correlation

No luck, there is statistically significant pairwise correlation between in three pairs of variables: x1 and x4, x4 and x6, and x5 and x6. Using LHS, it can take some time to be lucky enough until the drawn sample is correlation-free (alternatively, methods to minimize correlations have been extensively researched over the years, though no “silver bullet” really emerges).

This means any inference that works for both variables in any of these pairs may be suspect. The SampleVis toolbox contains also tools to plot whether these correlations are positive or negative.

### Space coverage

The toolbox enables to plot several indicators of space coverage, assuming that the sampled space is the unit hypercube of dimension p (p=7 in this example). It computes discrepancy and minimal distance indicators. Ironically, my random LHS with 7 variables and 100 members has a better discrepancy (here I use an indicator called L2-star discrepancy) than a Sobol’ sequence with as many variables and members. The minimal Euclidean distance as well is better than for Sobol’ (0.330 vs. 0.348). This means that if for our experiment, space coverage is more important than correlation, the drawn LHS is pretty good.

To better grasp how well points cover the whole space, it is interesting to plot the distance of the point that is closest to each point, and to represent that in growing order:

This means that some points are not evenly spaced, and some are more isolated than others. When dealing with a limited number of variables, it can also be interesting to visualize 2D projections of the sample, like this one:

This again goes to show that the sample is pretty-well distributed in space. We can compare with the same diagram for a Sobol’ sampling with 100 members and 7 variables:

It is pretty clear that the deterministic nature of Sobol’ sampling, for so few points, leaves more systematic holes in the sampled space. Of course, this sample is too small for any serious Sobol’ sensitivity analysis, and holes are plugged by a larger sample. But again, this comparison is a visual heuristic that tells a similar story as the global coverage indicator: this LHS draw is pretty good when it comes to coverage.

# References

Campolongo, F., Cariboni, J. & Saltelli, A. (2007). An effective screening design for sensitivity analysis of large models. Environmental Modelling & Software, 22, 1509 – 1518.

Cioppa, T. M. & Lucas, T. W. (2007). Efficient Nearly Orthogonal and Space-Filling Latin Hypercubes. Technometrics, 49, 45-55.

De Rainville, F.-M., Gagné, C., Teytaud, O. & Laurendeau, D. (2012). Evolutionary Optimization of Low-discrepancy Sequences. ACM Trans. Model. Comput. Simul., ACM, 22, 9:1-9:25.

Herman, J. D., Kollat, J. B., Reed, P. M. & Wagener, T. (2013). Technical Note: Method of Morris effectively reduces the computational demands of global sensitivity analysis for distributed watershed models. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 2893-2903.

Joe, S. & Kuo, F. (2008). Constructing Sobol Sequences with Better Two-Dimensional Projections. SIAM Journal on Scientific Computing, 30, 2635-2654.

McKay, M.D., Beckman R.J. & Conover, W.J. (1979).A Comparison of Three Methods for Selecting Values of Input Variables in the Analysis of Output from a Computer Code. Technometrics, 21(2), 239-245.

Morris, M. D. (1991). Factorial Sampling Plans for Preliminary Computational Experiments. Technometrics, 33, 161-174.

Saltelli, A., Annoni, P., Azzini, I., Campolongo, F., Ratto, M. & Tarantola, S. (2010). Variance based sensitivity analysis of model output. Design and estimator for the total sensitivity index. Computer Physics Communications, 181, 259 – 270.

Sheikholeslami, R. & Razavi, S. (2017). Progressive Latin Hypercube Sampling: An efficient approach for robust sampling-based analysis of environmental models. Environmental Modelling & Software, 93, 109 – 126.

Sobol’, I. (2001). Global sensitivity indices for nonlinear mathematical models and their Monte Carlo estimates. Mathematics and Computers in Simulation, 55, 271 – 280.

# Creating shaded dial plots in python

I recently created a code for plotting shaded dials (figures that look like gauges or speedometers) in python and I thought I’d share my code here. The dials are well suited to plot things such as risk or maybe the probability of meeting a set of robustness criteria across a range of decision variables (shameless plug: if you’re at EWRI this week, come check out my talk: Conflicts in Coalitions, Wednesday morning at 8:30 in Northstar B for which I created these figures).

As hinted at above, I originally created the plot to show bivariate data, with one variable plotted as the location on the dial and the other as the color. You could also plot the same variable as both color and location if you wanted to emphasize the meaning of increasing value on the dial. An example dial created with the code is shown below.

Example custom dial. The above figure consists of two images, a dial plot (originally constructed from a pie plot) and a color bar, made as a separate image but using the same data.

The color distribution, location of arrow and labeling of the gauge and colorbar are all fully customizable. I created the figure by first making a pie chart using marplotlib, inscribing a small white circle in the middle and then cropping the image in half using the Python image processing library (PIL also known as Pillow). The arrow is created using the matplotlib “arrow” function and will point to a specified location on the dial. The code is created such that you can add an array of any length to specify your colors, the array does not have to be monotonic like the one shown above, but will accept any values between zero and one (if your data is not in this range I’d suggest normalizing).

Annotated code is below:

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
from matplotlib import cm, gridspec
import numpy as np
import math
from PIL import Image
from mpl_toolkits.axes_grid1 import make_axes_locatable

# set your color array and name of figure here:
dial_colors = np.linspace(0,1,1000) # using linspace here as an example
figname = 'myDial'

# specify which index you want your arrow to point to
arrow_index = 750

# create labels at desired locations
# note that the pie plot ploots from right to left
labels = [' ']*len(dial_colors)*2
labels[25] = '100'
labels[250] = '75'
labels[500] = '50'
labels[750] = '25'
labels[975] = '0'

# function plotting a colored dial
def dial(color_array, arrow_index, labels, ax):
# Create bins to plot (equally sized)
size_of_groups=np.ones(len(color_array)*2)

# Create a pieplot, half white, half colored by your color array
white_half = np.ones(len(color_array))*.5
color_half = color_array
color_pallet = np.concatenate([color_half, white_half])

cs=cm.RdYlBu(color_pallet)
pie_wedge_collection = ax.pie(size_of_groups, colors=cs, labels=labels)

i=0
for pie_wedge in pie_wedge_collection[0]:
pie_wedge.set_edgecolor(cm.RdYlBu(color_pallet[i]))
i=i+1

# create a white circle to make the pie chart a dial
my_circle=plt.Circle( (0,0), 0.3, color='white')

# create the arrow, pointing at specified index
arrow_angle = (arrow_index/float(len(color_array)))*3.14159
arrow_x = 0.2*math.cos(arrow_angle)
arrow_y = 0.2*math.sin(arrow_angle)
ax.arrow(0,0,-arrow_x,arrow_y, width=.02, head_width=.05, \

# create figure and specify figure name
fig, ax = plt.subplots()

# make dial plot and save figure
dial(dial_colors, arrow_index, labels, ax)
ax.set_aspect('equal')
plt.savefig(figname + '.png', bbox_inches='tight')

# create a figure for the colorbar (crop so only colorbar is saved)
fig, ax2 = plt.subplots()
cmap = cm.ScalarMappable(cmap='RdYlBu')
cmap.set_array([min(dial_colors), max(dial_colors)])
cbar = plt.colorbar(cmap, orientation='horizontal')
cbar.ax.set_xlabel("Risk")
plt.savefig('cbar.png', bbox_inches='tight')
cbar = Image.open('cbar.png')
c_width, c_height = cbar.size
cbar = cbar.crop((0, .8*c_height, c_width, c_height)).save('cbar.png')

# open figure and crop bottom half
im = Image.open(figname + '.png')
width, height = im.size

# crop bottom half of figure
# function takes top corner &lt;span 				data-mce-type="bookmark" 				id="mce_SELREST_start" 				data-mce-style="overflow:hidden;line-height:0" 				style="overflow:hidden;line-height:0" 			&gt;&amp;#65279;&lt;/span&gt;and bottom corner coordinates
# of image to keep, (0,0) in python images is the top left corner
im = im.crop((0, 0, width+c_width, int(height/2.0))).save(figname + '.png')



## Other ways of doing this from around the web

This code was my way of making a dial plot, and I think it works well for plotting gradients on the dial. In the course of writing this I came across a couple similar codes, I’m listing them below. They both have advantages if you want to plot a small number of colors on your dial but I had trouble getting them to scale.

Here’s an example that creates dials using matplotlib patches, this method looks useful for plotting a small number of categorical data, I like the customization of the labels: http://nicolasfauchereau.github.io/climatecode/posts/drawing-a-gauge-with-matplotlib/

Here’s another alternative using the plotly library, I like the aesthetics but if you’re unfamiliar with plotly there’s a lot to learn before you can nicely customize the final product: https://plot.ly/python/gauge-charts/

# Creating Dendrograms in R

A dendrogram is an effective way of visualizing results from hierarchical clustering. The purpose of this post is to show how to make a basic dendrogram in R and illustrate the ways in which one can add colors to dendrogram labels and branches to help identify key clustering drivers. Making dendrograms in R is quite straightforward. However, customizing a dendrogram is not so straightforward, so this post shows some tricks that I learned and should help expedite the process!

First and foremost, your data must be in an appropriate from for hierarchical clustering to be conducted. Table 1 shows an example of how your data can be set up. Four different spatial temperatures projected by CMIP5 models are shown along with various attributes that could be potential driving forces behind clustering: the institution at which the model comes from, the RCP (radiative forcing scenario) used in the model, and the initial conditions with which the model was run.

Table 1: Model Attributes

At this point, it is helpful to add the model names as the row names (shown in the leftmost column) of your data frame, otherwise the dendrogram function will use the row number as a label on the dendrogram which can make it hard to interpret the clustering results.

Next, create a distance matrix, which will be composed of Euclidean distances between pairs of model projections. This is what clustering will be based on. We first create a new data frame composed of just the temperature values (shown below) by removing columns from the Model Attributes table.

Table 2: Temperature Projections

The following code can be used to create Table 2 from the original table and then the distance matrix.


#Create a new data frame with just temperature values

just_temperature=Model_Attributes[ -c(1:4) ]

#Create a distance matrix

d=dist(just_temperature)



Now, one can make the clustering diagram. Here I chose to use complete linkage clustering as the agglomeration method and wanted my dendrogram to be horizontal.


#Perform clustering

#Adjust dimensions of dendrogram so that it fits in plotting window

par(mar=c(3,4,1,15))



And that’s it! Here is the most basic dendrogram.

Figure 1: Dendrogram

Now for customization. You will first need to install the “dendextend” library in R.

We have 11 institutions that the models can come from and we want to visualize if institution has some impact on clustering, by assigning a color to the label. Here we use the rainbow color palette to assign each model a color and then replot the dendrogram.


library(dendextend)

#Create a vector of colors with one color for each institution

col=rainbow(max(Model_Attributes$Institution)) #Add colors to the ordered dendrogram labels_colors(complete_linkage_cluster)= col[Model_Attributes$Institution][order.dendrogram(complete_linkage_cluster)]

#Replot the dendrogram

par(mar=c(3,4,1,15)) #Dendrogram parameters



Figure 2: Dendrogram with Colored Labels

Now suppose we wanted to change the branch colors to show what RCP each model was run with. Here, we assign a color from the rainbow palette to each of the four RCPs and add it to the dendrogram.


col=rainbow(max(Model_Attributes$RCP)) col_branches= col[Model_Attributes$RCP][order.dendrogram(complete_linkage_cluster)]

par(mar=c(3,4,1,15))
plot(colored_dendrogram,horiz =TRUE)



Figure 3: Dendrogram with Colored Labels and Colored Branches

Now finally, we can change the node shapes to reflect the initial condition. There are 10 total initial conditions, so we’re going to use the first 10 standard pch (plot character) elements to represent the individual nodes.


pch=c(1:max(Model_Attributes$Initial_Conditions)) nodes=pch[Model_Attributes$Initial_Conditions[order.dendrogram(complete_linkage_cluster)]
nodePar = list(lab.cex = 0.6, pch = c(NA,19),cex = 0.7, col = "black") #node parameters

dend1 = colored_dendrogram %>% set("leaves_pch", c(nodes))

par(mar=c(3,4,1,15))
plot(dend1,horiz =TRUE)



Figure 4: Dendrogram with Colored Labels, Colored Branches, and Node Shapes

And that’s how you customize a dendrogram in R!

# Creating parallel axis plots with multiple datasets, color gradients, and brushing in Python

Parallel axis plots (here is a good description of what they are) are a relatively recent development in the plotting world, so it is no surprise that there is no implementations of it with more than basic functionalities in the major plotting packages available online. Over the past couple of days I then created my own implementation of parallel axis plots in Python using Matplotlib Pandas’ and Plot.ly’s implementation get cumbersome when the user tries to apply brushing and multiple color gradients  to create versatile, high-resolution and story-telling plots for my next papers and presentations. This implementation allows for:

• Plotting multiple datasets,
• Displaying dataset names,
• Choosing columns to be plot,
• Coloring each dataset based on a column and a different Matplotlib color map,
• Specifying ranges to be plotted,
• Inverting multiple axis,
• Brushing by intervales in multiple axis,
• Choosing different fonts for title and rest of the plot, and
• Export result as a figure file or viewing plot in Matplotlib’s interactive window.

The source code can be found here, and below is an example of how to use it:

import numpy as np
from plotting.parallel_axis import paxis_plot
from matplotlib.colors import LinearSegmentedColormap
from matplotlib import cm

bu_cy = LinearSegmentedColormap.from_list('BuCy', [(0, 0, 1), (0, 1, 1)])
bu_cy_r = bu_cy.reversed()

data1 = np.random.normal(size=(100, 8))
data2 = np.random.normal(size=(100, 8))
columns_to_plot = [0, 1, 3, 5, 7]
color_column = 0
axis_labels = ['axes ' + str(i) for i in range(8)]
dataset_names = ['Data set 1', 'Data set 2']
plot_ranges = [[-3.5, 3.5]] * 3 + [[-2.9, 3.1]] + [[-3.5, 3.5]] * 4
axis_to_invert = [1, 5]
brush_criteria = {1: [-10., 0.], 7: [10., 0.]}

paxis_plot((data1, data2),
columns_to_plot,
color_column,
[bu_cy_r, cm.get_cmap('autumn_r')],
axis_labels,
'Title Here',
dataset_names,
axis_ranges=plot_ranges,
fontname_title='Gill Sans MT',
fontname_body='CMU Bright',
file_name='test.png',
axis_to_invert=axis_to_invert,
brush_criteria=brush_criteria)


The output of this script should be a file named “test.png” that looks similar to the plot below:

# Logistic Regression for Scenario Discovery

As most of you probably know, scenario discovery is an exploratory modeling approach [Bankes, 1993] that involves stress-testing proposed policies over plausible future “states of the world” (SOWs) to discover conditions under which those policies would fail to meet performance goals [Bryant and Lempert, 2010]. The scenario discovery process is therefore an exercise in statistical classification. Two commonly used methods used for the scenario discovery process are the Patient Rule Induction Method (PRIM; Friedman and Fisher [1999]) and Classification and Regression Trees (CART; Breiman et al. [1984]), both of which are included in the OpenMORDM R package and Rhodium Python package.

Another commonly used method in classification that hasn’t been given much attention in the scenario discovery literature is logistic regression. Logistic regression models estimate the probability that an event is classified as a success (1) as opposed to a failure (0) as a function of different covariates. This allows for the definition of “safe operating spaces,” or factor combinations leading to success, based on the probability with which one would like to be able to achieve the specified performance goal(s). We may not know the probability that a particular SOW will occur, but through the logistic regression we can estimate the probability of success in that SOW should it occur. The logistic regression can also identify which factors most influence a policy’s ability to meet those performance goals.

This blog post will illustrate how to build logistic regression models in Python for scenario discovery using the Red River basin as an example. Here we are interested in determining under what streamflow and demand characteristics reservoir operating policies are unable to protect Hanoi from the 100-yr flood. We assume operators want to ensure protection to this event with at least 95% reliability and use logistic regression to estimate under what combination of streamflow and demand characteristics they will be able to do so.

The form of the logistic regression model is given by Equation 1, where pi represents the probability that performance in the ith SOW is classified as a success and Xi represents a vector of covariates (in this case, streamflow and demand characteristics) describing the ith SOW:

1) $\ln\Bigg(\frac{p_i}{1-p_i}\Bigg) = \mathbf{X_i^\intercal}\mathbf{\beta}$.

The coefficients, $\mathbf{\beta}$, on the covariates are estimated using Maximum Likelihood Estimation.

To determine which streamflow and demand characteristics are most important in explaining successes and failures, we can compare the McFadden’s pseudo-R2 values associated with different models that include different covariates. McFadden’s pseudo-R2, $R_{McFadden}^2$, is given by Equation 2:

2) $R_{McFadden}^2 = 1 - \frac{\ln \hat{L}(M_{Full})}{\ln \hat{L}(M_{Intercept})}$

where $\ln \hat{L}(M_{Full})$ is the log-likelihood of the full model and $\ln \hat{L}(M_{Intercept})$ is the log-likelihood of the intercept model, i.e. a model with no covariates beyond the intercept. The intercept model therefore predicts the mean probability of success across all SOWs. $R_{McFadden}^2$ is a measure of improvement of the full model over the intercept model.

A common approach to fitting regression models is to add covariates one-by-one based on which most increase R2 (or in this case, $R_{McFadden}^2$), stopping once the increase of an additional covariate is marginal. The covariate that by itself most increases $R_{McFadden}^2$ is therefore the most important in predicting a policy’s success. To do this in Python, we will use the library statsmodels.

Imagine we have a pandas dataframe, dta that includes n columns of streamflow and demand characteristics describing different SOWs (rows) and a final column of 0s and 1s representing whether or not the policy being evaluated can provide protection to the 100-yr flood in that SOW (0 for no and 1 for yes). Assume the column of 0s and 1s is the last column and it is labeled Success. We can find the value of $R_{McFadden}^2$ for each covariate individually by running the following code:

import pandas as pd
import statsmodels.api as sm
from scipy import stats

# deal with fact that calling result.summary() in statsmodels.api
# calls scipy.stats.chisqprob, which no longer exists
stats.chisqprob = lambda chisq, df: stats.chi2.sf(chisq, df)

def fitLogit(dta, predictors):
# concatenate intercept column of 1s
dta['Intercept'] = np.ones(np.shape(dta)[0])

# get columns of predictors
cols = dta.columns.tolist()[-1:] + predictors

#fit logistic regression
logit = sm.Logit(dta['Success'], dta[cols])
result = logit.fit()

return result

n = len(dta.columns) - 1
for i in range(n):
predictors = dta.columns.tolist()[i:(i+1)]
result = fitLogit(dta, predictors)
print(result.summary())



A sample output for one predictor, Col1 is shown below. This predictor has a pseudo-R2 of 0.1138.

Once the most informative predictor has been determined, additional models can be tested by adding more predictors one-by-one as described above. Suppose that through this process, one finds that the first 3 columns of dta (Col1,Col2 and Col3) are the most informative for predicting success on providing protection to the 100-yr flood, while the subsequent columns provide little additional predictive power. We can use this model to visualize the probability of success as a function of these 3 factors using a contour map. If we want to show this as a 2D projection, the probability of success can only be shown for combinations of 2 of these factors. In this case, we can hold the third factor constant at some value, say its base value. This is illustrated in the code below, which also shows a scatter plot of the SOWs. The dots are shaded light blue if the policy succeeds in providing protection to the 100-yr flood in that world, and dark red if it does not.


import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import matplotlib as mpl
import seaborn as sns
import pandas as pd
import statsmodels.api as sm

def fitLogit(dta, predictors):
# concatenate intercept column of 1s
dta['Intercept'] = np.ones(np.shape(dta)[0])

# get columns of predictors
cols = dta.columns.tolist()[-1:] + predictors

#fit logistic regression
logit = sm.Logit(dta['Success'], dta[cols])
result = logit.fit()

return result

def plotContourMap(ax, result, constant, dta, contour_cmap, dot_cmap, levels, xgrid, ygrid, \
xvar, yvar, base):

# find probability of success for x=xgrid, y=ygrid
X, Y = np.meshgrid(xgrid, ygrid)
x = X.flatten()
y = Y.flatten()
if constant == 'x3': # 3rd predictor held constant at base value
grid = np.column_stack([np.ones(len(x)),x,y,np.ones(len(x))*base[2]])
elif constant == 'x2': # 2nd predictor held constant at base value
grid = np.column_stack([np.ones(len(x)),x,np.ones(len(x))*base[1],y])
else: # 1st predictor held constant at base value
grid = np.column_stack([np.ones(len(x)),np.ones(len(x))*base[0],x,y])

z = result.predict(grid)
Z = np.reshape(z, np.shape(X))

contourset = ax.contourf(X, Y, Z, levels, cmap=contour_cmap)
ax.scatter(dta[xvar].values, dta[yvar].values, c=dta['Success'].values, edgecolor='none', cmap=dot_cmap)
ax.set_xlim(np.min(X),np.max(X))
ax.set_ylim(np.min(Y),np.max(Y))
ax.set_xlabel(xvar,fontsize=24)
ax.set_ylabel(yvar,fontsize=24)
ax.tick_params(axis='both',labelsize=18)

return contourset

# build logistic regression model with first 3 columns of predictors from dta
predictors = dta.columns.tolist()[0:3]
result = fitLogit(dta, predictors)

# define color map for dots representing SOWs in which the policy
# succeeds (light blue) and fails (dark red)
dot_cmap = mpl.colors.ListedColormap(np.array([[227,26,28],[166,206,227]])/255.0)

# define color map for probability contours
contour_cmap = mpl.cm.get_cmap(‘RdBu’)

# define probability contours
contour_levels = np.arange(0.0, 1.05,0.1)

# define grid of x (1st predictor), y (2nd predictor), and z (3rd predictor) dimensions
# to plot contour map over
xgrid = np.arange(-0.1,1.1,0.01)
ygrid = np.arange(-0.1,1.1,0.01)
zgrid = np.arange(-0.1,1.1,0.01)

# define base values of 3 predictors
base = [0.5, 0.5, 0.5]

fig = plt.figure()
# plot contour map when 3rd predictor ('x3') is held constant
plotContourMap(ax, result, 'x3', dta, contour_cmap, dot_cmap, contour_levels, xgrid, ygrid, \
'Col1', 'Col2', base)
# plot contour map when 2nd predictor ('x2') is held constant
contourset = plotContourMap(ax, result, 'x2', dta, contour_cmap, dot_cmap, contour_levels, xgrid, zgrid, \
'Col1', 'Col3', base)

cbar_ax = fig.add_axes([0.85, 0.15, 0.05, 0.7])
cbar = fig.colorbar(contourset, cax=cbar_ax)
cbar_ax.set_ylabel('Probability of Success',fontsize=20)
yticklabels = cbar.ax.get_yticklabels()
cbar.ax.set_yticklabels(yticklabels,fontsize=18)
fig.set_size_inches([14.5,8])
fig.savefig('Fig1.png')
fig.clf()



This produces the following figure:

We can also use the probability contours discovered above to define “safe operating spaces” as combinations of these 3 factors under which the evaluated policy is able to succeed in providing protection to the 100-yr flood with some reliability, say 95%. The hyperplane of factor combinations defining that 95% probability contour can be determined by setting p to 0.95 in Equation 2. Again, to plot 2-D projections of that hyperplane, the values of the other covariates can be held constant at their base values. The code below illustrates how to do this with a 95% boundary.


# define colormap for classifying boundary between failure and success
class_cmap = mpl.colors.ListedColormap(np.array([[251,154,153],[31,120,180]])/255.0)

# define probability cutoff between failure and success
class_levels = [0.0, 0.95, 1.0]

fig = plt.figure()
# plot contour map when 3rd predictor ('x3') is held constant
plotContourMap(ax, result, 'x3', dta, class_cmap, dot_cmap, class_levels, xgrid, ygrid, \
'Col1', 'Col2', base)

# plot contour map when 2nd predictor ('x2') is held constant
plotContourMap(ax, result, 'x2', dta, class_cmap, dot_cmap, class_levels, xgrid, zgrid, \
'Col1', 'Col3', base)

fig.set_size_inches([14.5,8])
fig.savefig('Fig2.png')
fig.clf()



This produces the following figure, where the light red region is the parameter ranges in which the policy cannot provide protection to the 100-yr flood with 95% reliability, and the dark blue region is the “safe operating space” in which it can.

All code for this example can be found here.

# Policy Diagnostics with Time-Varying and State Space PDFs

Some of my work has focused on “policy diagnostics,” analyzing how policies (in this case, multi-reservoir operating policies) that favor different objectives perform under different conditions and why. This can guide analysts in choosing a policy to implement, or even in determining objectives that policies should be optimized to (cough, cough, see Quinn et al., 2017). One of the more effective ways we’ve found to analyze these policies is by examining their probabilistic behavior through time-varying PDFs and state-space PDFs. This blog post will illustrate these two types of figures and provide sample code for creating them. The code for the versions of these figures generated in the above paper can be found here.

Below is an example of how time-varying PDFs can provide insights into system behavior using the Red River basin as an example. These plots show the probability of the water level in Hanoi (y axis in both figures) being at different levels on different days of the year (x axis in both figures), from the beginning of the monsoon in May to the end of the dry season in April. Red shades represent high probabilities and blue shades represent low probabilities. The left plot shows these dynamics for a policy minimizing the 100-yr annual maximum water level, while the right plot shows them for a policy maximizing the 100-yr average hydropower production. The flood-minimizing policy has a lower probability of overtopping the dikes and crossing a stakeholder-elicited alarm level of 11.25 m (Second Alarm) compared to the hydropower-maximizing policy. However, this reduction in the probability of high floodwaters requires a higher probability of crossing a lower stakeholder-elicited alarm level of 6 m (First Alarm), highlighting a tradeoff between reducing severe floods and nuisance floods. There are also different dynamics during the dry season, where the flood-minimizing solution releases more to both meet agricultural demand at the time of planting and lower the reservoir level in advance of the next monsoon. There is a bifurcation in the high probability density streak during this time, suggesting how much needs to be released depends on what is needed to lower the reservoir level to an acceptable pre-flood season level or meet the agricultural demand.

To create this figure, we simply need an N x 365 matrix of the water level on each day (column) of N different annual simulations (rows). Let’s call this matrix ‘data’. We then need to reformat ‘data’ into a Y x 365 matrix, where Y is the number of “bins” along the y axis (between ymin and ymax) that we are going to group our data into to make a histogram for each day. Finally, we just need to count how many data points occur in each bin, and then divide this count by the total number of simulated years, N. This is shown using the function ‘getTimeVaryingProbs.py’ below assuming we have two datasets we want to plot, ‘data1’ and ‘data2’.

import numpy as np

def getTimeVaryingProbs(data, N, Y, ymin, ymax):
'''Finds the probability of being at a specific water level (y) on a given day.'''
probMatrix = np.zeros([Y,365])
step = (ymax-ymin)/Y
for i in range(np.shape(probMatrix)[0]):
for j in range(np.shape(probMatrix)[1]):
count = ((data[:,j] < ymax-step*i) & (data[:,j] >= ymax-step*(i+1))).sum()
probMatrix[i,j] = count/N

return probMatrix

probMatrix1 = getTimeVaryingProbs(data1, 100000, 366, 0, 15)
probMatrix2 = getTimeVaryingProbs(data2, 100000, 366, 0, 15)


After calling ‘getTimeVaryingProbs.py’ to generate ‘probMatrix1’ and ‘probMatrix2’, we can plot the time-varying PDF of each of these using ‘imshow’. Since we want to compare the two side-by-side, we need to make sure they’re normalized over the same range. We do this by finding the lowest and highest probabilities over the two matrices and normalizing our color map over that range:

import numpy as np
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import matplotlib as mpl

# find the lowest and highest probability between two probability matrices
probMin = min(np.min(probMatrix1), np.min(probMatrix2))
probMax = max(np.max(probMatrix1), np.max(probMatrix2))

fig = plt.figure()
sm = ax1.imshow(probMatrix1, cmap='RdYlBu', origin='upper', norm=mpl.colors.Normalize(vmin=probMin, vmax=ProbMax))
sm = ax2.imshow(probMatrix2, cmap='RdYlBu', origin='upper', norm=mpl.colors.Normalize(vmin=probMin, vmax=ProbMax))
cbar_ax = fig.add_axes([0.85, 0.15, 0.05, 0.7])
cbar = fig.colorbar(sm, cax=cbar_ax)
cbar.ax.set_ylabel('Probability Density',fontsize=16)
fig.show()


In some cases, it may be helpful to plot a log transformation of the probability matrices, as was done in the above paper since streamflows are highly skewed.

Below is an example of how state-space PDFs can provide insights into system behavior, again using the Red River basin as an example. These plots show the probability of the water level in Hanoi (y axis in both figures) being at different levels when the total storage in the reservoirs upstream is at different levels (x axis in both figures). Red shades again represent high probabilities and blue shades represent low probabilities. The left plot shows these dynamics for a compromise policy optimized to one set of objectives, while the right plot shows them for a compromise policy optimized to a different set of objectives. The compromise policy on the left fills up the reservoirs without releasing much water downstream, resulting in a high probability streak along the bottom of the plot at low water levels. This will favor hydropower production. However, when the largest reservoirs fill up, they are forced to spill, resulting in a spike in the water level downstream. This occurs before the smaller reservoirs have filled up, and in wet years, results in overtopping before total system storage has been reached. Consequently, this policy does not make full use of the total system storage for flood protection. The compromise policy on the right, however, increases the system storage and water level simultaneously, releasing some of what initially comes in to leave empty capacity for future flood events. This strategy makes better use of the full system capacity, only resulting in overtopping when maximum system storage has been reached. The difference in the behavior of these two compromise solutions highlights the need to test rival framings of objective functions for multi-objective optimization, as some formulations may suffer unintended consequences like the formulation on the left.

To create this figure, we need two N x 365 matrices, one of the water level on each day (column) of N different annual simulations (rows) and another of the total system storage. Let’s call these matrices ‘h’ and ‘s’, respectively. We then need to use these matrices to populate a Y x X probability matrix, where Y is the number of bins along the y axis (water level, h) between ymin and ymax, and X the number of bins along the x axis (storage, s) between xmin and xmax. This probability matrix will represent a 2D histogram of how many data points lie in a combined water level and storage bin.  We again just need to count how many data points occur in each bin, and then divide this count by the total number of simulated points (365N). This is shown using the function ‘getJointProbs.py’ below assuming we have two joint datasets, (h1,s1) and (h2,s2), that we want to plot.

def getJointProbs(h, s, Y, X, ymax, ymin, xmax, xmin):
'''Finds the probability of being at a specific water level (h) and storage (s) jointly'''
probMatrix = np.zeros([Y,X])
yStep = (ymax-ymin)/np.shape(probMatrix)[0]
xStep = (xmax-xmin)/np.shape(probMatrix)[1]
for i in range(np.shape(s)[0]):
for j in range(np.shape(s)[1]):
# figure out which "box" the simulated s and h are in
row = int(np.floor((ymax-h[i,j])/yStep))
col = int(np.ceil((s[i,j]-xmin)/xStep))
if row < np.shape(probMatrix)[0] and col < np.shape(probMatrix)[1]:
probMatrix[row,col] = probMatrix[row,col] + 1

# calculate probability of being in each box
probMatrix = probMatrix/(np.shape(s)[0]*np.shape(s)[1])

return probMatrix

probMatrix1 = getJointProbs(h1, s1, 100, 100, 15, 0, 3.0E10, 0.5E10)
probMatrix2 = getJointProbs(h2, s2, 100, 100, 15, 0, 3.0E10, 0.5E10)


After calling ‘getJointProbs.py’ to generate ‘probMatrix1’ and ‘probMatrix2’, we can again plot the state space PDF of each of these using ‘imshow’ as illustrated in the second snippet of code above. Now go analyze how your reservoirs are probabilistically operating as a system!

# Plotting trajectories and direction fields for a system of ODEs in Python

The aim of this post is to guide the reader through plotting trajectories and direction fields for a system of equations in Python. This is useful when investigating the equilibria and stability of the system, and to facilitate in understanding the general behavior of a system under study. I will use a system of predator-prey equations, that my most devoted online readers are already familiar with from my previous posts on identifying equilibria and stability, and on nondimensionalization. Specifically, I’ll be using the Lotka-Volterra set of equations with Holling’s Type II functional response:

$\frac{\mathrm{d} x}{\mathrm{d} t}=bx\left ( 1-\frac{x}{K} \right )-\frac{axy}{1+ahx}$

$\frac{\mathrm{d} y}{\mathrm{d} t}=\frac{caxy}{1+ahx}-dy$

where:

x: prey abundance

y: predator abundance

b: prey growth rate

d: predator death rate

c: rate with which consumed prey is converted to predator

a: rate with which prey is killed by a predator per unit of time

K: prey carrying capacity given the prey’s environmental conditions

h: handling time

This system has 3 equilibria: when both species are dead (0,0), when predators are dead and the prey grows to its carrying capacity (K,0) and a non-trivial equilibrium where both species coexist and is generally more interesting, given by:

$y^*=\frac{b}{a}(1+ahx^*)\left(1-\frac{x^*}{K} \right)$

$x^*=\frac{d}{a(c-dh)}$

The following code should produce both trajectories and direction fields for this system of ODEs (python virtuosos please excuse the extensive commenting, I try to comment as much as possible for people new to python):

import numpy as np
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
from scipy import integrate

# I'm using this style for a pretier plot, but it's not actually necessary
plt.style.use('ggplot')

"""
This is to ignore RuntimeWarning: invalid value encountered in true_divide
I know that when my populations are zero there's some division by zero and
the resulting error terminates my function, which I want to avoid in this case.
"""
np.seterr(divide='ignore', invalid='ignore')

# These are the parameter values we'll be using
a = 0.005
b = 0.5
c = 0.5
d = 0.1
h = 0.1
K = 2000

# Define the system of ODEs
# P[0] is prey, P[1] is predator
def fish(P, t=0):
return ([b*P[0]*(1-P[0]/K) - (a*P[0]*P[1])/(1+a*h*P[0]),
c*(a*P[0]*P[1])/(1+a*h*P[0]) - d*P[1] ])

# Define equilibrium point
EQ = ([d/(a*(c-d*h)),b*(1+a*h*(d/(a*(c-d*h))))*(1-(d/(a*(c-d*h)))/K)/a])

"""
I need to define the possible values my initial points will take as they
relate to the equilibrium point. In this case I chose to plot 10 trajectories
ranging from 0.1 to 5
"""
values = np.linspace(0.1, 5, 10)
# I want each trajectory to have a different color
vcolors = plt.cm.autumn_r(np.linspace(0.1, 1, len(values)))

# Open figure
f = plt.figure()
"""
I need to define a range of time over which to integrate the system of ODEs
The values don't really matter in this case because our system doesn't have t
on the right hand side of dx/dt and dy/dt, but it is a necessary input for
integrate.odeint.
"""
t = np.linspace(0, 150, 1000)

# Plot trajectories by looping through the possible values
for v, col in zip(values, vcolors):
# Starting point of each trajectory
P0 = [E*v for E in EQ]
# Integrate system of ODEs to get x and y values
P = integrate.odeint(fish, P0, t)
# Plot each trajectory
plt.plot( P[:,0], P[:,1],
# Different line width for different trajectories (optional)
lw=0.5*v,
# Different color for each trajectory
color=col,
# Assign starting point to trajectory label
label='P0=(%.f, %.f)' % ( P0[0], P0[1]) )
"""
To plot the direction fields we first need to define a grid in order to
compute the direction at each point
"""
# Get limits of trajectory plot
ymax = plt.ylim(ymin=0)[1]
xmax = plt.xlim(xmin=0)[1]
# Define number of points
nb_points = 20
# Define x and y ranges
x = np.linspace(0, xmax, nb_points)
y = np.linspace(0, ymax, nb_points)
# Create meshgrid
X1 , Y1 = np.meshgrid(x,y)
# Calculate growth rate at each grid point
DX1, DY1 = fish([X1, Y1])
# Direction at each grid point is the hypotenuse of the prey direction and the
# predator direction.
M = (np.hypot(DX1, DY1))
# This is to avoid any divisions when normalizing
M[ M == 0] = 1.
# Normalize the length of each arrow (optional)
DX1 /= M
DY1 /= M

plt.title('Trajectories and direction fields')
"""
This is using the quiver function to plot the field of arrows using DX1 and
DY1 for direction and M for speed
"""
Q = plt.quiver(X1, Y1, DX1, DY1, M, pivot='mid', cmap=plt.cm.plasma)
plt.xlabel('Prey abundance')
plt.ylabel('Predator abundance')
plt.legend(bbox_to_anchor=(1.05, 1.0))
plt.grid()
plt.xlim(0, xmax)
plt.ylim(0, ymax)
plt.show()



This should produce the following plot. All P0s are the initial conditions we defined.

We can also see that this parameter combination produces limit cycles in our system. If we change the parameter values to:

a = 0.005
b = 0.5
c = 0.5
d = 0.1
h = 0.1
K = 200


i.e. reduce the available resources to the prey, our trajectories look like this:

The equilibrium becomes stable, attracting the trajectories to it.

The same can be seen if we increase the predator death rate:

a = 0.005
b = 0.5
c = 0.5
d = 1.5
h = 0.1
K = 2000


The implication of this observation is that an initially stable system, can become unstable given more resources for the prey or less efficient predators. This has been referred to as the Paradox of Enrichment and other predator-prey models have tried to address it (more on this in future posts).

P.S: I would also like to link to this scipy tutorial, that I found very helpful and that contains more plotting tips.