Covariance functions return the covariance
\(C(h)\) between a pair locations separated by distance \(h\). The covariance function can be written as a product of a variance parameter \(\sigma^2\) and a positive definite correlation function \(\rho(h)\): \(C(h) = \sigma^2 \rho(h)\), see, e.g.,
Banerjee et al. (2004) p. 27 for more details. The expressions of the correlations functions available in spBayes are given below. More will be added upon request.
For all correlations functions, \(\phi\) is the spatial decay parameter.
Some of the correlation functions will have an extra parameter
\(\nu\), the smoothness parameter.
\(K_\nu(x)\) denotes the modified Bessel
function of the third kind of order \(\nu\). See
documentation of the function besselK
for further details.
The following functions are valid for \(\phi>0\) and \(\nu>0\), unless stated otherwise.
gaussian
$$\rho(h) = \exp[-(\phi h)^2]$$
exponential
$$\rho(h) = \exp(-\phi h)$$
matern
$$\rho(h) =
\frac{1}{2^{\nu-1}\Gamma(\nu)}(\phi h)^\nu
K_{\nu}(\phi h)$$
spherical
$$\rho(h) = \left\{ \begin{array}{ll}
1 - 1.5\phi h + 0.5(\phi h)^3
\mbox{ , if $h$ < $\frac{1}{\phi}$} \cr
0 \mbox{ , otherwise}
\end{array} \right.$$