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We study the task of efficiently sampling from a Gibbs distribution $d \pi^* = e^{-h} d {vol}_g$ over a Riemannian manifold $M$ via (geometric) Langevin MCMC; this algorithm involves computing exponential maps in random Gaussian directions…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2024-02-19 Xiang Cheng , Jingzhao Zhang , Suvrit Sra

We study the problem of sampling from strongly log-concave distributions over $\mathbb{R}^d$ using the Poisson midpoint discretization (a variant of the randomized midpoint method) for overdamped/underdamped Langevin dynamics. We prove its…

Probability · Mathematics 2025-10-02 Rishikesh Srinivasan , Dheeraj Nagaraj

We present a new perspective on the celebrated Sinkhorn algorithm by showing that is a special case of incremental/stochastic mirror descent. In order to see this, one should simply plug Kullback-Leibler divergence in both mirror map and…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-09-17 Konstantin Mishchenko

Coupling arguments are a central tool for bounding the deviation between two stochastic processes, but traditionally have been limited to Wasserstein metrics. In this paper, we apply the shifted composition rule--an information-theoretic…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2024-12-25 Jason M. Altschuler , Sinho Chewi

Langevin Dynamics has been extensively employed in global non-convex optimization due to the concentration of its stationary distribution around the global minimum of the potential function at low temperatures. In this paper, we propose to…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2023-05-22 Ryo Fujino

Priors with non-smooth log-densities, such as the l1-prior, are widely used in Bayesian inverse problems for their sparsity-inducing properties. Existing Langevin-based sampling methods typically rely on proximal mappings or smooth…

Numerical Analysis · Mathematics 2026-05-05 Ivan Cheltsov , Federico Cornalba , Clarice Poon , Tony Shardlow

We study a sampling problem whose target distribution is $\pi \propto \exp(-f-r)$ where the data fidelity term $f$ is Lipschitz smooth while the regularizer term $r=r_1-r_2$ is a non-smooth difference-of-convex (DC) function, i.e.,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-05-21 Hoang Phuc Hau Luu , Zhongjian Wang

This paper deals with a method for the approximation of a spectral density function among the solutions of a generalized moment problem a` la Byrnes/Georgiou/Lindquist. The approximation is pursued with respect to the Kullback-Leibler…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2009-11-04 Augusto Ferrante , Federico Ramponi , Francesco Ticozzi

For many applications, such as computing the expected value of different magnitudes, sampling from a known probability density function, the target density, is crucial but challenging through the inverse transform. In these cases, rejection…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-03-24 Sebastian Pina-Otey , Thorsten Lux , Federico Sánchez , Vicens Gaitan

We propose and analyze a class of adaptive sampling algorithms for multimodal distributions on a bounded domain, which share a structural resemblance to the classic overdamped Langevin dynamics. We first demonstrate that this class of…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-11-26 Björn Engquist , Kui Ren , Yunan Yang

Motivated by the computation of the non-parametric maximum likelihood estimator (NPMLE) and the Bayesian posterior in statistics, this paper explores the problem of convex optimization over the space of all probability distributions. We…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2023-11-03 Rentian Yao , Linjun Huang , Yun Yang

We study the problem of estimating a distribution over a finite alphabet from an i.i.d. sample, with accuracy measured in relative entropy (Kullback-Leibler divergence). While optimal bounds on the expected risk are known, high-probability…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2026-02-27 Jaouad Mourtada

We characterize Martin-L\"of randomness and Schnorr randomness in terms of the merging of opinions, along the lines of the Blackwell-Dubins Theorem. After setting up a general framework for defining notions of merging randomness, we focus…

Logic · Mathematics 2026-03-10 Simon M. Huttegger , Sean Walsh , Francesca Zaffora Blando

This paper addresses the problem of approximating an unknown probability distribution with density $f$ -- which can only be evaluated up to an unknown scaling factor -- with the help of a sequential algorithm that produces at each iteration…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2024-09-23 Pascal Bianchi , Bernard Delyon , Victor Priser , François Portier

We study the Proximal Langevin Algorithm (PLA) for sampling from a probability distribution $\nu = e^{-f}$ on $\mathbb{R}^n$ under isoperimetry. We prove a convergence guarantee for PLA in Kullback-Leibler (KL) divergence when $\nu$…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2019-11-06 Andre Wibisono

In this work, we examine sampling problems with non-smooth potentials. We propose a novel Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm for sampling from non-smooth potentials. We provide a non-asymptotical analysis of our algorithm and establish a…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-02-11 Jiaming Liang , Yongxin Chen

We study sampling from a target distribution $\nu_* = e^{-f}$ using the unadjusted Langevin Monte Carlo (LMC) algorithm when the potential $f$ satisfies a strong dissipativity condition and it is first-order smooth with a Lipschitz…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2021-07-09 Murat A. Erdogdu , Rasa Hosseinzadeh , Matthew S. Zhang

Discretizations of Langevin diffusions provide a powerful method for sampling and Bayesian inference. However, such discretizations require evaluation of the gradient of the potential function. In several real-world scenarios, obtaining…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2021-01-19 Abhishek Roy , Lingqing Shen , Krishnakumar Balasubramanian , Saeed Ghadimi

This paper provides an elementary, self-contained analysis of diffusion-based sampling methods for generative modeling. In contrast to existing approaches that rely on continuous-time processes and then discretize, our treatment works…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2025-06-25 Galen Reeves , Henry D. Pfister

Discrete diffusion models have achieved strong empirical performance in text and other symbolic domains, with masked (absorbing-rate) variants emerging as competitive alternatives to autoregressive models. Among existing samplers, the Euler…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-02-27 Yuchen Liang , Zhiheng Tan , Ness Shroff , Yingbin Liang