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Related papers: Differentiation of Blackbox Combinatorial Solvers

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A common practice in most of deep convolutional neural architectures is to employ fully-connected layers followed by Softmax activation to minimize cross-entropy loss for the sake of classification. Recent studies show that substitution or…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2017-10-23 Arash Shahriari

In this paper, we propose a hybrid framework to solve large-scale permutation-based combinatorial problems effectively using a high-performance quadratic unconstrained binary optimization (QUBO) solver. To do so, transformations are…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2021-07-07 Siong Thye Goh , Sabrish Gopalakrishnan , Jianyuan Bo , Hoong Chuin Lau

There is a long history in machine learning of model ensembling, beginning with boosting and bagging and continuing to the present day. Much of this history has focused on combining models for classification and regression, but recently…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-05-28 Ira Globus-Harris , Varun Gupta , Michael Kearns , Aaron Roth

This paper introduces a new deep learning approach to approximately solve the Covering Salesman Problem (CSP). In this approach, given the city locations of a CSP as input, a deep neural network model is designed to directly output the…

Neural and Evolutionary Computing · Computer Science 2021-09-15 Kaiwen Li , Tao Zhang , Rui Wang Yuheng Wang , Yi Han

Impactful applications such as materials discovery, hardware design, neural architecture search, or portfolio optimization require optimizing high-dimensional black-box functions with mixed and combinatorial input spaces. While Bayesian…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-03-21 Leonard Papenmeier , Luigi Nardi , Matthias Poloczek

Combinatorial optimization has found applications in numerous fields, from aerospace to transportation planning and economics. The goal is to find an optimal solution among a finite set of possibilities. The well-known challenge one faces…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2020-06-03 Quentin Cappart , Thierry Moisan , Louis-Martin Rousseau , Isabeau Prémont-Schwarz , Andre Cire

In the machine learning algorithms, the choice of the hyperparameter is often an art more than a science, requiring labor-intensive search with expert experience. Therefore, automation on hyperparameter optimization to exclude human…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-12-08 Taehyeon Kim , Jaeyeon Ahn , Nakyil Kim , Seyoung Yun

Integrating combinatorial optimization layers into neural networks has recently attracted significant research interest. However, many existing approaches lack theoretical guarantees or fail to perform adequately when relying on inexact…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-09-30 Germain Vivier-Ardisson , Mathieu Blondel , Axel Parmentier

We develop an algorithmic theory of convex optimization over discrete sets. Using a combination of algebraic and geometric tools we are able to provide polynomial time algorithms for solving broad classes of convex combinatorial…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2009-01-24 Shmuel Onn

The Traveling Salesman Problem is one of the most intensively studied combinatorial optimization problems due both to its range of real-world applications and its computational complexity. When combined with the Set Covering Problem, it…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-07-08 Yuwen Yang , Jayant Rajgopal

In statistics, it is common to encounter multi-modal and non-smooth likelihood (or objective function) maximization problems, where the parameters have known upper and lower bounds. This paper proposes a novel derivative-free global…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2023-09-14 Priyam Das

We propose a generative, end-to-end solver for black-box combinatorial optimization that emphasizes both sample efficiency and solution quality on NP problems. Drawing inspiration from annealing-based algorithms, we treat the black-box…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-08-07 Yuan-Hang Zhang , Massimiliano Di Ventra

In discrete-variable black-box optimization, the number of candidate solutions grows combinatorially, while each evaluation is often expensive. Therefore, it is important to identify promising solutions efficiently within a limited number…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2026-05-12 Reo Shikanai , Masayuki Ohzeki

Traditional solvers for tackling combinatorial optimization (CO) problems are usually designed by human experts. Recently, there has been a surge of interest in utilizing deep learning, especially deep reinforcement learning, to…

Neural and Evolutionary Computing · Computer Science 2023-04-13 Shengcai Liu , Yu Zhang , Ke Tang , Xin Yao

We present a new approach for modeling avoidance constraints in 2D environments, in which waypoints are assigned to obstacle-free polyhedral regions. Constraints of this form are often formulated as mixed-integer programming (MIP) problems…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-11-20 Raul Garcia , Illya V. Hicks , Joey Huchette

End-to-end training of neural network solvers for graph combinatorial optimization problems such as the Travelling Salesperson Problem (TSP) have seen a surge of interest recently, but remain intractable and inefficient beyond graphs with…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-05-26 Chaitanya K. Joshi , Quentin Cappart , Louis-Martin Rousseau , Thomas Laurent

Choosing automatically the right algorithm using problem descriptors is a classical component of combinatorial optimization. It is also a good tool for making evolutionary algorithms fast, robust and versatile. We present Shiwa, an…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2020-04-30 Jialin Liu , Antoine Moreau , Mike Preuss , Baptiste Roziere , Jeremy Rapin , Fabien Teytaud , Olivier Teytaud

Differentiable optimization has attracted significant research interest, particularly for quadratic programming (QP). Existing approaches for differentiating the solution of a QP with respect to its defining parameters often rely on…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-10-31 Connor W. Magoon , Fengyu Yang , Noam Aigerman , Shahar Z. Kovalsky

This work provides a Deep Reinforcement Learning approach to solving a periodic review inventory control system with stochastic vendor lead times, lost sales, correlated demand, and price matching. While this dynamic program has…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-11-30 Dhruv Madeka , Kari Torkkola , Carson Eisenach , Anna Luo , Dean P. Foster , Sham M. Kakade

In this paper, we introduce novel fast matrix inversion algorithms that leverage triangular decomposition and recurrent formalism, incorporating Strassen's fast matrix multiplication. Our research places particular emphasis on triangular…

Numerical Analysis · Mathematics 2026-02-05 Mohamed Kamel Riahi