3
$\begingroup$

Let $Z = XY$ be a random variable which is the product of two independent random variables $X\sim\mathcal{N}(0,\sigma^2)$ and $Y\sim \text{Exp}(\lambda)$. I'm wondering, is there some way to write the expression for the PDF of $Z$? (Side note: this question is very similar, but didn't get an answer)

Based on the standard definition of the product of two independent random variables, the PDF of $Z$, $f_Z(z)$, can be written as:

\begin{align} f_Z(z) &= \int_{0}^{\infty}f_Y(x)f_X(z/x)\frac{1}{x}dx\\ &= \int_{0}^{\infty}\lambda\exp(-\lambda x)\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi\sigma^2}}\exp\Big(\frac{-z^2}{2\sigma^2x^2}\Big)\frac{1}{x}dx \end{align}

I'm not too sure how to go about simplifying this. Any ideas? Approximations?

$\endgroup$
0

    1 Answer 1

    1
    $\begingroup$

    I don't think it can be expressed in an elementary way. Maple evaluates the integral as $$ \frac{1}{\pi z} G^{3, 0}_{0, 3}\left({\frac {{z}^{2}{\lambda}^{2}}{{8\sigma}^{2}}}\, \Big\vert\,^{}_{1, 1/2, 1/2}\right)$$ where $G$ is the Meijer G function.

    $\endgroup$

      You must log in to answer this question.

      Start asking to get answers

      Find the answer to your question by asking.

      Ask question

      Explore related questions

      See similar questions with these tags.