Related papers: The Geometry of Sign Gradient Descent
Traditional analyses of gradient descent show that when the largest eigenvalue of the Hessian, also known as the sharpness $S(\theta)$, is bounded by $2/\eta$, training is "stable" and the training loss decreases monotonically. Recent…
Stochastic gradients for deep neural networks exhibit strong correlations along the optimization trajectory, and are often aligned with a small set of Hessian eigenvectors associated with outlier eigenvalues. Recent work shows that…
We consider Sharpness-Aware Minimization (SAM), a gradient-based optimization method for deep networks that has exhibited performance improvements on image and language prediction problems. We show that when SAM is applied with a convex…
In this paper, we consider a general stochastic optimization problem which is often at the core of supervised learning, such as deep learning and linear classification. We consider a standard stochastic gradient descent (SGD) method with a…
This paper formalizes and analyzes Gaussian smoothing applied to two prominent optimization methods: Stochastic Gradient Descent (GSmoothSGD) and Adam (GSmoothAdam) in deep learning. By attenuating small fluctuations, Gaussian smoothing…
This paper shows that the implicit bias of gradient descent on linearly separable data is exactly characterized by the optimal solution of a dual optimization problem given by a smoothed margin, even for general losses. This is in contrast…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) has been a go-to algorithm for nonconvex stochastic optimization problems arising in machine learning. Its theory however often requires a strong framework to guarantee convergence properties. We hereby…
Deep learning experiments by Cohen et al. [2021] using deterministic Gradient Descent (GD) revealed an Edge of Stability (EoS) phase when learning rate (LR) and sharpness (i.e., the largest eigenvalue of Hessian) no longer behave as in…
In this paper, we provide a rigorous proof of convergence of the Adaptive Moment Estimate (Adam) algorithm for a wide class of optimization objectives. Despite the popularity and efficiency of the Adam algorithm in training deep neural…
Training large neural networks requires distributing learning across multiple workers, where the cost of communicating gradients can be a significant bottleneck. signSGD alleviates this problem by transmitting just the sign of each…
Decentralized optimization has become a fundamental tool for large-scale learning systems; however, most existing methods rely on the classical Lipschitz smoothness assumption, which is often violated in problems with rapidly varying…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD), which dates back to the 1950s, is one of the most popular and effective approaches for performing stochastic optimization. Research on SGD resurged recently in machine learning for optimizing convex loss…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) is a popular and efficient method with wide applications in training deep neural nets and other nonconvex models. While the behavior of SGD is well understood in the convex learning setting, the existing…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) is a simple and popular method to solve stochastic optimization problems which arise in machine learning. For strongly convex problems, its convergence rate was known to be O(\log(T)/T), by running SGD for…
For strongly convex objectives that are smooth, the classical theory of gradient descent ensures linear convergence relative to the number of gradient evaluations. An analogous nonsmooth theory is challenging. Even when the objective is…
Understanding the dynamics of optimization in deep learning is increasingly important as models scale. While stochastic gradient descent (SGD) and its variants reliably find solutions that generalize well, the mechanisms driving this…
Smoothness is crucial for attaining fast rates in first-order optimization. However, many optimization problems in modern machine learning involve non-smooth objectives. Recent studies relax the smoothness assumption by allowing the…
In this paper, we study the implicit regularization of the gradient descent algorithm in homogeneous neural networks, including fully-connected and convolutional neural networks with ReLU or LeakyReLU activations. In particular, we study…
Sign-based optimization algorithms, such as SignSGD and Muon, have garnered significant attention for their remarkable performance in training large foundation models. Despite this empirical success, we still lack a theoretical…
In this paper, we investigate a general class of stochastic gradient descent (SGD) algorithms, called Conditioned SGD, based on a preconditioning of the gradient direction. Using a discrete-time approach with martingale tools, we establish…