Related papers: Guaranteed Non-convex Optimization: Submodular Max…
In machine learning and big data, the optimization objectives based on set-cover, entropy, diversity, influence, feature selection, etc. are commonly modeled as submodular functions. Submodular (function) maximization is generally NP-hard,…
Submodular functions are relevant to machine learning for at least two reasons: (1) some problems may be expressed directly as the optimization of submodular functions and (2) the lovasz extension of submodular functions provides a useful…
Motivated by practical applications, recent works have considered maximization of sums of a submodular function $g$ and a linear function $\ell$. Almost all such works, to date, studied only the special case of this problem in which $g$ is…
We study the problem of maximizing a non-monotone submodular function under multiple knapsack constraints. We propose a simple discrete greedy algorithm to approach this problem, and prove that it yields strong approximation guarantees for…
We investigate the performance of a deterministic GREEDY algorithm for the problem of maximizing functions under a partition matroid constraint. We consider non-monotone submodular functions and monotone subadditive functions. Even though…
Submodular functions and their optimization have found applications in diverse settings ranging from machine learning and data mining to game theory and economics. In this work, we consider the constrained maximization of a submodular…
Seminal work by Edmonds and Lovasz shows the strong connection between submodularity and convexity. Submodular functions have tight modular lower bounds, and subdifferentials in a manner akin to convex functions. They also admit poly-time…
Maximizing a single submodular set function subject to a cardinality constraint is a well-studied and central topic in combinatorial optimization. However, finding a set that maximizes multiple functions at the same time is much less…
We consider non-monotone DR-submodular function maximization, where DR-submodularity (diminishing return submodularity) is an extension of submodularity for functions over the integer lattice based on the concept of the diminishing return…
In contrast to the many continuous global optimization methods that assume the objective function and constraints are factorable, we study how to find globally maximal solutions to problems that are not factorable, focusing on a particular…
The greedy algorithm for monotone submodular function maximization subject to cardinality constraint is guaranteed to approximate the optimal solution to within a $1-1/e$ factor. Although it is well known that this guarantee is essentially…
In this paper, we consider the problem of black box continuous submodular maximization where we only have access to the function values and no information about the derivatives is provided. For a monotone and continuous DR-submodular…
In this paper, we showcase the interplay between discrete and continuous optimization in network-structured settings. We propose the first fully decentralized optimization method for a wide class of non-convex objective functions that…
We present a practical and powerful new framework for both unconstrained and constrained submodular function optimization based on discrete semidifferentials (sub- and super-differentials). The resulting algorithms, which repeatedly compute…
Submodular functions have applications throughout machine learning, but in many settings, we do not have direct access to the underlying function $f$. We focus on stochastic functions that are given as an expectation of functions over a…
In this paper, we study the problem of \textit{constrained} and \textit{stochastic} continuous submodular maximization. Even though the objective function is not concave (nor convex) and is defined in terms of an expectation, we develop a…
In this paper, we consider the unconstrained submodular maximization problem. We propose the first algorithm for this problem that achieves a tight $(1/2-\varepsilon)$-approximation guarantee using $\tilde{O}(\varepsilon^{-1})$ adaptive…
In this paper, we introduce a novel technique for constrained submodular maximization, inspired by barrier functions in continuous optimization. This connection not only improves the running time for constrained submodular maximization but…
The objective of a two-stage submodular maximization problem is to reduce the ground set using provided training functions that are submodular, with the aim of ensuring that optimizing new objective functions over the reduced ground set…
Mean field inference in probabilistic models is generally a highly nonconvex problem. Existing optimization methods, e.g., coordinate ascent algorithms, can only generate local optima. In this work we propose provable mean filed methods for…