BAYESIAN-ANALYSIS OF LINEAR AND NONLINEAR POPULATION-MODELS BY USING THE GIBBS SAMPLER

A fully Bayesian analysis of linear and non-linear population models has previously been unavailable, as a consequence of the seeming impossibility of performing the necessary numerical integrations in the complex multiparameter structures that typically arise in such models. It is demonstrated that, for a variety of linear and non-linear population models, a fully Bayesian analysis can be implemented in a straightforward manner by using the Gibbs sampler. The approach is illustrated with examples involving challenging problems of outliers and mean-variance relationships in population modelling.