Next: The Gamma Distribution, Previous: The Levy alpha-Stable Distributions, Up: Random Number Distributions
This function returns a random variate from the Levy skew stable distribution with scale c, exponent alpha and skewness parameter beta. The skewness parameter must lie in the range [-1,1]. The Levy skew stable probability distribution is defined by a Fourier transform,
p(x) = {1 \over 2 \pi} \int_{-\infty}^{+\infty} dt \exp(-it x - |c t|^alpha (1-i beta sign(t) tan(pi alpha/2)))When \alpha = 1 the term \tan(\pi \alpha/2) is replaced by -(2/\pi)\log|t|. There is no explicit solution for the form of p(x) and the library does not define a corresponding
The algorithm only works for 0 < alpha <= 2.
The Levy alpha-stable distributions have the property that if N alpha-stable variates are drawn from the distribution p(c, \alpha, \beta) then the sum Y = X_1 + X_2 + \dots + X_N will also be distributed as an alpha-stable variate, p(N^(1/\alpha) c, \alpha, \beta).