NScluster: An R Package for Maximum Palm Likelihood Estimation for Cluster Point Process Models Using OpenMP

Abstract

NScluster is an R package used for simulation and parameter estimation for NeymanScott cluster point process models and their extensions. For parameter estimation, NScluster uses the maximum Palm likelihood estimation procedure. As some estimation procedures proposed herein require heavy calculation, NScluster can use parallel computation via OpenMP and achieve significant speedup in some cases. In this paper, we discuss results obtained using a laptop PC and a shared memory supercomputer. In addition, we examine the performance characteristics of parallel computation via OpenMP.