Distances between power spectral densities

Abstract

We present several natural notions of distance between spectral density functions of (discrete-time) random processes. They are motivated by certain filtering problems. First we quantify the degradation of performance of a predictor which is designed for a particular spectral density function and then it is used to predict the values of a random process having a different spectral density. The logarithm of the ratio between the variance of the error, over the corresponding minimal (optimal) variance, produces a measure of distance between the two power spectra with several desirable properties. Analogous quantities based on smoothing problems produce alternative distances and suggest a class of measures based on fractions of generalized means of ratios of power spectral densities. These distance measures endow the manifold of spectral density functions with a (pseudo) Riemannian metric. We pursue one of the possible options for a distance measure, characterize the relevant geodesics, and compute corresponding distances.