[2603.22558] Maximum Entropy Relaxation of Multi-Way Cardinality Constraints for Synthetic Population Generation

Computer Science > Artificial Intelligence arXiv:2603.22558 (cs) [Submitted on 23 Mar 2026] Title:Maximum Entropy Relaxation of Multi-Way Cardinality Constraints for Synthetic Population Generation Authors:François Pachet, Jean-Daniel Zucker View a PDF of the paper titled Maximum Entropy Relaxation of Multi-Way Cardinality Constraints for Synthetic Population Generation, by Fran\c{c}ois Pachet and Jean-Daniel Zucker View PDF HTML (experimental) Abstract:Generating synthetic populations from aggregate statistics is a core component of microsimulation, agent-based modeling, policy analysis, and privacy-preserving data release. Beyond classical census marginals, many applications require matching heterogeneous unary, binary, and ternary constraints derived from surveys, expert knowledge, or automatically extracted descriptions. Constructing populations that satisfy such multi-way constraints simultaneously poses a significant computational challenge. We consider populations where each individual is described by categorical attributes and the target is a collection of global frequency constraints over attribute combinations. Exact formulations scale poorly as the number and arity of constraints increase, especially when the constraints are numerous and overlapping. Grounded in methods from statistical physics, we propose a maximum-entropy relaxation of this problem. Multi-way cardinality constraints are matched in expectation rather than exactly, yielding an exponential-family...