John van der Hoek is an Associate Professor at the University of South Australia. He has authored papers in partial differential equations, free boundary value problems, numerical analysis, stochastic analysis, actuarial science and mathematical finance. With Robert Elliott he co-authored Binomial Methods in Finance. Robert J. Elliott is a Research Professor at the University of South Australia. Previously he held positions at universities around the world, including Yale, Oxford, Alberta, Calgary and Adelaide. He has authored nine books, including Mathematics of Financial Markets (2004, with P. E. Kopp) and Stochastic Calculus and Application (1982).

• Preface; 1. Observed Markov chains; 2. Estimation of an observed Markov chain; 3. Hidden Markov models; 4. Filters and smoothers; 5. The Viterbi algorithm; 6. The EM algorithm; 7. A new Markov chain model; 8. Semi-Markov models; 9. Hidden semi-Markov models; 10. Filters for hidden semi-Markov models; Appendix A. Higher order chains; Appendix B. An example of a second order chain; Appendix C. A conditional Bayes theorem; Appendix D. On conditional expectations; Appendix E. Some molecular biology; Appendix F. Earlier applications of hidden Markov chain models; References; Index.

'… this book is of interest to researchers attracted by hidden Markov and semi-Markov models. It covers probabilistic and statistical treatments of the considered topics, and introduces the reader … to possible applications, mainly in genomics. Hence, Ph.D. students and specialists in the area of hidden Markov processes are invited to consider this book as a reference in their activities.' Antonio Di Crescenzo, MathSciNet