Càdlàg – Wikipedia

In mathematics, a càdlàg (French: “continue à droite, limite à gauche“), RCLL (“right continuous with left limits”), or corlol (“continuous on (the) right, limit on (the) left”) function is a function defined on the real numbers (or a subset of them) that is everywhere right-continuous and has left limits everywhere. Càdlàg functions are important in the study of stochastic processes that admit (or even require) jumps, unlike Brownian motion, which has continuous sample paths. The collection of càdlàg functions on a given domain is known as Skorokhod space.

Two related terms are càglàd, standing for “continue à gauche, limite à droite”, the left-right reversal of càdlàg, and càllàl for “continue à l’un, limite à l’autre” (continuous on one side, limit on the other side), for a function which at each point of the domain is either càdlàg or càglàd.

Definition[edit]

Example of a cumulative distribution function with a countably infinite set of discontinuities.

Let (M, d) be a metric space, and let E ⊆ R. A function f: E → M is called a càdlàg function if, for every t ∈ E,

• the left limit f(t−) := lim_s↑t f(s) exists; and
• the right limit f(t+) := lim_s↓t f(s) exists and equals f(t).

That is, f is right-continuous with left limits.

Examples[edit]

Skorokhod space[edit]

The set of all càdlàg functions from E to M is often denoted by D(E; M) (or simply D) and is called Skorokhod space after the Ukrainian mathematician Anatoliy Skorokhod. Skorokhod space can be assigned a topology that, intuitively allows us to “wiggle space and time a bit” (whereas the traditional topology of uniform convergence only allows us to “wiggle space a bit”).^[1] For simplicity, take E = [0, T] and M = Rⁿ — see Billingsley^[2] for a more general construction.

We must first define an analogue of the modulus of continuity, ϖ′_ƒ(δ). For any F ⊆ E, set

${displaystyle w_{f}(F):=sup _{s,tin F}|f(s)-f(t)|}$

and, for δ > 0, define the càdlàg modulus to be

${displaystyle varpi ‘_{f}(delta ):=inf _{Pi }max _{1leq ileq k}w_{f}([t_{i-1},t_{i})),}$

where the infimum runs over all partitions Π = {0 = t₀ < t₁ < … < t_k = T}, k ∈ N, with min_i (t_i − t_i−1) > δ. This definition makes sense for non-càdlàg ƒ (just as the usual modulus of continuity makes sense for discontinuous functions) and it can be shown that ƒ is càdlàg if and only if ϖ′_ƒ(δ) → 0 as δ → 0.

Now let Λ denote the set of all strictly increasing, continuous bijections from E to itself (these are “wiggles in time”). Let

${displaystyle |f|:=sup _{tin E}|f(t)|}$

denote the uniform norm on functions on E. Define the Skorokhod metric σ on D by

${displaystyle sigma (f,g):=inf _{lambda in Lambda }max{|lambda -I|,|f-gcirc lambda |},}$

where I: E → E is the identity function. In terms of the “wiggle” intuition, ||λ − I|| measures the size of the “wiggle in time”, and ||ƒ − g○λ|| measures the size of the “wiggle in space”.

It can be shown that the Skorokhod metric is indeed a metric. The topology Σ generated by σ is called the Skorokhod topology on D.

An equivalent metric,

${displaystyle d(f,g):=inf _{lambda in Lambda }(|lambda -I|+|f-gcirc lambda |),}$

was introduced independently and utilized in control theory for the analysis of switching systems.^[3]

Properties of Skorokhod space[edit]

Generalization of the uniform topology[edit]

The space C of continuous functions on E is a subspace of D. The Skorokhod topology relativized to C coincides with the uniform topology there.

Completeness[edit]

It can be shown that, although D is not a complete space with respect to the Skorokhod metric σ, there is a topologically equivalent metric σ₀ with respect to which D is complete.^[4]

Separability[edit]

With respect to either σ or σ₀, D is a separable space. Thus, Skorokhod space is a Polish space.

Tightness in Skorokhod space[edit]

By an application of the Arzelà–Ascoli theorem, one can show that a sequence (μ_n)_n=1,2,… of probability measures on Skorokhod space D is tight if and only if both the following conditions are met:

${displaystyle lim _{ato infty }limsup _{nto infty }mu _{n}{big (}{fin D;|;|f|geq a}{big )}=0,}$

and

${displaystyle lim _{delta to 0}limsup _{nto infty }mu _{n}{big (}{fin D;|;varpi ‘_{f}(delta )geq varepsilon }{big )}=0{text{ for all }}varepsilon >0.}$

Algebraic and topological structure[edit]

Under the Skorokhod topology and pointwise addition of functions, D is not a topological group, as can be seen by the following example:

Let

${displaystyle E=[0,2)}$

be a half-open interval and take

${displaystyle f_{n}=chi _{[1-1/n,2)}in D}$

to be a sequence of characteristic functions.
Despite the fact that

${displaystyle f_{n}rightarrow chi _{[1,2)}}$

in the Skorokhod topology, the sequence

${displaystyle f_{n}-chi _{[1,2)}}$

does not converge to 0.

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Further reading[edit]