Nested QMC designs on spheres

Abstract

Nested cubature rules, in which each refinement retains all previously used nodes and thus reuses earlier function evaluations, are natural in multilevel and adaptive integration. For every fixed $s>d/2$, we show that the equal-weight QMC integration rate on ${\mathbb{S}}^d$ is compatible with such nested point sets. In the subcritical range $d/2<s<d$, cumulative unions of geometrically growing QMC blocks yield nested QMC design sequences whose successive cardinality ratios converge to any prescribed $\rho >1$. At and above the critical index $s=d$, where the block-averaging estimate no longer yields the optimal rate, we prove an equal-weight completion theorem based on low-frequency discrepancy cancellation. A block-sensitive estimate sharpens the iteration and yields nested QMC designs for all $s\ge d$ with $N_{j+1}\lesssim (j+1{)}^{2s/d-1}{N}_j$. Every prescribed finite point set also admits an optimal-rate completion.

12 pages