The PageRank algorithm, developed by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, assigns a ranking to web pages based on their importance, which is determined by the links between them. The convergence of the PageRank vector is proven through the properties of Markov chains and the Perron-Frobenius theorem. Specifically, the PageRank matrix , representing the probabilities of transitioning from one page to another, is a stochastic matrix, meaning that its columns sum to one.
To demonstrate convergence, we show that as the number of iterations approaches infinity, the PageRank vector approaches a unique stationary distribution . This is expressed mathematically as:
where is the transition matrix. The proof hinges on the fact that is irreducible and aperiodic, ensuring that any initial distribution converges to the same stationary distribution regardless of the starting point, thus confirming the robustness of the PageRank algorithm in ranking web pages.
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