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In this paper we analyze a family of general random block coordinate descent methods for the minimization of $\ell_0$ regularized optimization problems, i.e. the objective function is composed of a smooth convex function and the $\ell_0$…
In this paper we consider finite sum composite convex optimization problems with many functional constraints. The objective function is expressed as a finite sum of two terms, one of which admits easy computation of (sub)gradients while the…
Large scale optimization problems are ubiquitous in machine learning and data analysis and there is a plethora of algorithms for solving such problems. Many of these algorithms employ sub-sampling, as a way to either speed up the…
This paper investigates a category of constrained fractional optimization problems that emerge in various practical applications. The objective function for this category is characterized by the ratio of a numerator and denominator, both…
Stochastic Gradient (SG) is the defacto iterative technique to solve stochastic optimization (SO) problems with a smooth (non-convex) objective $f$ and a stochastic first-order oracle. SG's attractiveness is due in part to its simplicity of…
Optimization in machine learning typically deals with the minimization of empirical objectives defined by training data. However, the ultimate goal of learning is to minimize the error on future data (test error), for which the training…
We introduce biased gradient oracles to capture a setting where the function measurements have an estimation error that can be controlled through a batch size parameter. Our proposed oracles are appealing in several practical contexts, for…
Utility-Based Shortfall Risk (UBSR) is a risk metric that is increasingly popular in financial applications, owing to certain desirable properties that it enjoys. We consider the problem of estimating UBSR in a recursive setting, where…
This paper considers non-smooth optimization problems where we seek to minimize the pointwise maximum of a continuously parameterized family of functions. Since the objective function is given as the solution to a maximization problem,…
In this paper we consider convex optimization problems with stochastic composite objective function subject to (possibly) infinite intersection of constraints. The objective function is expressed in terms of expectation operator over a sum…
We propose \textit{Meta-Regularization}, a novel approach for the adaptive choice of the learning rate in first-order gradient descent methods. Our approach modifies the objective function by adding a regularization term on the learning…
We study optimization algorithms for the finite sum problems frequently arising in machine learning applications. First, we propose novel variants of stochastic gradient descent with a variance reduction property that enables linear…
Many core problems in robotics can be framed as constrained optimization problems. Often on these problems, the robotic system has uncertainty, or it would be advantageous to identify multiple high quality feasible solutions. To enable…
Distributionally robust optimization (DRO) problems are increasingly seen as a viable method to train machine learning models for improved model generalization. These min-max formulations, however, are more difficult to solve. We therefore…
We consider the projected gradient algorithm for the nonconvex best subset selection problem that minimizes a given empirical loss function under an $\ell_0$-norm constraint. Through decomposing the feasible set of the given sparsity…
This paper focuses on convex constrained optimization problems, where the solution is subject to a convex inequality constraint. In particular, we aim at challenging problems for which both projection into the constrained domain and a…
A common problem in the sciences is that a signal of interest is observed only indirectly, through smooth functionals of the signal whose values are then obscured by noise. In such inverse problems, the functionals dampen or entirely…
This paper deals with composite optimization problems having the objective function formed as the sum of two terms, one has Lipschitz continuous gradient along random subspaces and may be nonconvex and the second term is simple and…
A framework is introduced for solving a sequence of slowly changing optimization problems, including those arising in regression and classification applications, using optimization algorithms such as stochastic gradient descent (SGD). The…
We consider the problem of estimating and optimizing utility-based shortfall risk (UBSR) of a loss, say $(Y - \hat Y)^2$, in the context of a regression problem. Empirical risk minimization with a UBSR objective is challenging since UBSR is…