Robert S. Liptser

At the end of 1960s and the beginning of 1970s, when the Russian version of this book was written, the 'general theory of random processes' did not operate widely with such notions as semimartingale, stochastic integral with respect to semimartingale, the Ito formula for semimartingales, etc. At that time in stochastic calculus (theory of martingales), the main object was the square integrable martingale. In a short time, this theory was applied to such areas as nonlinear filtering, optimal stochastic control, statistics for diffusion­ type processes. In the first edition of these volumes, the stochastic calculus, based on square integrable martingale theory, was presented in detail with the proof of the Doob-Meyer decomposition for submartingales and the description of a structure for stochastic integrals. In the first volume ('General Theory') these results were used for a presentation of further important facts such as the Girsanov theorem and its generalizations, theorems on the innovation pro­ cesses, structure of the densities (Radon-Nikodym derivatives) for absolutely continuous measures being distributions of diffusion and ItO-type processes, and existence theorems for weak and strong solutions of stochastic differential equations. All the results and facts mentioned above have played a key role in the derivation of 'general equations' for nonlinear filtering, prediction, and smoothing of random processes.

At the end of 1960s and the beginning of 1970s, when the Russian version of this book was written, the 'general theory of random processes' did not operate widely with such notions as semimartingale, stochastic integral with respect to semimartingale, the ItO formula for semimartingales, etc. At that time in stochastic calculus (theory of martingales), the main object was the square integrable martingale. In a short time, this theory was applied to such areas as nonlinear filtering, optimal stochastic control, statistics for diffusion­ type processes. In the first edition of these volumes, the stochastic calculus, based on square integrable martingale theory, was presented in detail with the proof of the Doob-Meyer decomposition for submartingales and the description of a structure for stochastic integrals. In the first volume ('General Theory') these results were used for a presentation of further important facts such as the Girsanov theorem and its generalizations, theorems on the innovation pro­ cesses, structure of the densities (Radon-Nikodym derivatives) for absolutely continuous measures being distributions of diffusion and Itô-type processes, and existence theorems for weak and strong solutions of stochastic differential equations. All the results and facts mentioned above have played a key role in the derivation of 'general equations' for nonlinear filtering, prediction, and smoothing of random processes.

At the end of 1960s and the beginning of 1970s, when the Russian version of this book was written, the 'general theory of random processes' did not operate widely with such notions as semimartingale, stochastic integral with respect to semimartingale, the Ito formula for semimartingales, etc. At that time in stochastic calculus (theory of martingales), the main object was the square integrable martingale. In a short time, this theory was applied to such areas as nonlinear filtering, optimal stochastic control, statistics for diffusion­ type processes. In the first edition of these volumes, the stochastic calculus, based on square integrable martingale theory, was presented in detail with the proof of the Doob-Meyer decomposition for submartingales and the description of a structure for stochastic integrals. In the first volume ('General Theory') these results were used for a presentation of further important facts such as the Girsanov theorem and its generalizations, theorems on the innovation pro­ cesses, structure of the densities (Radon-Nikodym derivatives) for absolutely continuous measures being distributions of diffusion and ItO-type processes, and existence theorems for weak and strong solutions of stochastic differential equations. All the results and facts mentioned above have played a key role in the derivation of 'general equations' for nonlinear filtering, prediction, and smoothing of random processes.

The subject of these two volumes is non-linear filtering (prediction and smoothing) theory and its application to the problem of optimal estimation, control with incomplete data, information theory and sequential testing of hypothesis.

One service mathematics has rc:ndered the 'Et moi, "', si j'avait su comment CD revenir, je n'y serais point alle. ' human race. It has put common SCIIJC back Jules Verne where it belongs. on the topmost shelf next to tbe dusty canister 1abdled 'discarded non- The series is divergent; tberefore we may be sense'. able to do sometbing witb it Eric T. Bell O. Heaviside Mathematics is a tool for thought. A highly necessary tool in a world where both feedback and non- linearities abound. Similarly, all kinds of parts of mathematics serve as tools for other parts and for other sciences. Applying a simple rewriting rule to the quote on the right above one finds such statements as: 'One service topology has rendered mathematical physics ...'; 'One service logic has rendered com- puter science ...'; 'One service category theory has rendered mathematics ...'. All arguably true_ And all statements obtainable this way form part of the raison d'etre of this series_ This series, Mathematics and Its ApplicatiOns, started in 1977. Now that over one hundred volumes have appeared it seems opportune to reexamine its scope_ At the time I wrote "Growing specialization and diversification have brought a host of monographs and textbooks on increasingly specialized topics. However, the 'tree' of knowledge of mathematics and related fields does not grow only by putting forth new branches.