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Mixed-Integer Linear Programming (MILP) is a powerful framework used to address a wide range of NP-hard combinatorial optimization problems, often solved by Branch and Bound (B&B). A key factor influencing the performance of B&B solvers is…

A big challenge in branch and bound lies in identifying the optimal node within the search tree from which to proceed. Current state-of-the-art selectors utilize either hand-crafted ensembles that automatically switch between naive sub-node…

In many operational applications, it is necessary to routinely find, within a very limited time window, provably good solutions to challenging mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) problems. An example is the Security-Constrained Unit…

Reinforcement learning tasks in real-world scenarios often involve large, high-dimensional action spaces, leading to challenges such as convergence difficulties, instability, and high computational complexity. It is widely acknowledged that…

We apply a branch-and-bound (B\&B) algorithm to the D-optimality problem based on a convex mixed-integer nonlinear formulation. We discuss possible methodologies to accelerate the convergence of the B\&B algorithm, by combining the use of…

Branch-and-bound (BnB) algorithms are widely used to solve combinatorial problems, and the performance crucially depends on its branching heuristic.In this work, we consider a typical problem of maximum common subgraph (MCS), and propose a…

Branch-and-bound is a typical way to solve combinatorial optimization problems. This paper proposes a graph pointer network model for learning the variable selection policy in the branch-and-bound. We extract the graph features, global…

Recent advancements have introduced machine learning frameworks to enhance the Branch and Bound (B\&B) branching policies for solving Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP). These methods, primarily relying on imitation learning of Strong…

In distributed optimization, the practical problem-solving performance is essentially sensitive to algorithm selection, parameter setting, problem type and data pattern. Thus, it is often laborious to acquire a highly efficient method for a…

Mixed Integer programs (MIPs) are typically solved by the Branch-and-Bound algorithm. Recently, Learning to imitate fast approximations of the expert strong branching heuristic has gained attention due to its success in reducing the running…

Network adaptation is essential for the efficient operation of Cloud-RANs. Unfortunately, it leads to highly intractable mixed-integer nonlinear programming problems. Existing solutions typically rely on convex relaxation, which yield…

Many traditional algorithms for solving combinatorial optimization problems involve using hand-crafted heuristics that sequentially construct a solution. Such heuristics are designed by domain experts and may often be suboptimal due to the…

Tree search algorithms, such as branch-and-bound, are the most widely used tools for solving combinatorial and nonconvex problems. For example, they are the foremost method for solving (mixed) integer programs and constraint satisfaction…

Modern Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) solvers use the Branch-and-Bound algorithm together with a plethora of auxiliary components that speed up the search. In recent years, there has been an explosive development in the use of…

This paper proposes Branch & Learn, a framework for Predict+Optimize to tackle optimization problems containing parameters that are unknown at the time of solving. Given an optimization problem solvable by a recursive algorithm satisfying…

A recent Graph Neural Network (GNN) approach for learning to branch has been shown to successfully reduce the running time of branch-and-bound algorithms for Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP). While the GNN relies on a GPU for…

On the occasion of the 20th Mixed Integer Program Workshop's computational competition, this work introduces a new approach for learning to solve MIPs online. Influence branching, a new graph-oriented variable selection strategy, is applied…

Recent years have seen stagnating improvements to branch predictor (BP) efficacy and a dearth of fresh ideas in branch predictor design, calling for fresh thinking in this area. This paper argues that looking at BP from the viewpoint of…

In this paper, we propose a Bi-layer Predictionbased Reduction Branch (BP-RB) framework to speed up the process of finding a high-quality feasible solution for Mixed Integer Programming (MIP) problems. A graph convolutional network (GCN) is…

A convenient approach to optimally solving combinatorial optimization tasks is the Branch-and-Bound method. Its branching heuristic can be learned to solve a large set of similar tasks. The promising results here are achieved by the…