Working with numbers smaller tha 10^-308

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Hi,
I would like to know if it is possible to use Matlab for very small numbers (smaller than 10^-308 ). It's very important for my application "statistical genetics". in this field, somes probabilities are smaller than 10^-500.
Thank you
  4 Comments
sadoune sadoune
sadoune sadoune on 9 May 2013
Hi Robert,
You can imagine a vector length 500, each case represent a probability, and the probability i would like to compute is the product of all this probabilities (independance).
John Doe
John Doe on 9 May 2013
Ok, then I see where you get the number from, but if you are ending up with a probability that low, it is literally impossible for it to happen. Isn't OK to just let it be equal to 0?
I don't mean to be rude or condescending, I just don't get how it would make sense to keep working with numbers that low.
Anyhow, I hope someone can provide an answer for you, and good luck =)

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Answers (2)

Sean de Wolski
Sean de Wolski on 9 May 2013
Edited: Sean de Wolski on 9 May 2013
You can do this using vpa() in the Symbolic Math Toolbox:
v = vpa('3.14159^-5000')
And for more info:
You could also use exact symbolic arithmetic:
sym('3.1415^-34334')
  3 Comments
Sean de Wolski
Sean de Wolski on 10 May 2013
That's because you're doing the computation as a double and then converting it to vpa(). Convert it to vpa before doing the computation:
for i=400:-1:1
tab(i)=vpa(0.1);
end
v = (prod(tab))

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Peter Perkins
Peter Perkins on 11 May 2013
Quite often in statistics when one has very small probabilities, one works on the log scale. That's why one typically maximizes the LOG-likelihood, and not the likelihood.

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