Related papers: Minimizing a low-dimensional convex function over …
It has been well established that first order optimization methods can converge to the maximal objective value of concave functions and provide constant factor approximation guarantees for (non-convex/non-concave) continuous submodular…
A central problem in the theory of algorithms for data streams is to determine which functions on a stream can be approximated in sublinear, and especially sub-polynomial or poly-logarithmic, space. Given a function $g$, we study the space…
A well-studied nonlinear extension of the minimum-cost flow problem is to minimize the objective $\sum_{ij\in E} C_{ij}(f_{ij})$ over feasible flows $f$, where on every arc $ij$ of the network, $C_{ij}$ is a convex function. We give a…
We propose a proximal variable smoothing algorithm for nonsmooth optimization problem with sum of three functions involving weakly convex composite function. The proposed algorithm is designed as a time-varying forward-backward splitting…
We study distributed composite optimization over networks: agents minimize a sum of smooth (strongly) convex functions, the agents' sum-utility, plus a nonsmooth (extended-valued) convex one. We propose a general unified algorithmic…
Higher-order tensor methods were recently proposed for minimizing smooth convex and nonconvex functions. Higher-order algorithms accelerate the convergence of the classical first-order methods thanks to the higher-order derivatives used in…
We perform the first tight convergence analysis of the gradient method with varying step sizes when applied to smooth hypoconvex (weakly convex) functions. Hypoconvex functions are smooth nonconvex functions whose curvature is bounded and…
In this paper, we obtain subdifferential representation of a proper $w^*$-lower semicontinous convex function on $X^*$ as follows: Let $g$ be a proper convex $w^*$-lower semicontinuous function on $X^*$. Assume that int dom $g$…
It is well known that limits can be computed by restricting along an initial functor, and that this often simplifies limit computation. We systematically study the algorithmic implications of this idea for diagrams indexed by a finite…
This paper considers an optimization problem for a dynamical system whose evolution depends on a collection of binary decision variables. We develop scalable approximation algorithms with provable suboptimality bounds to provide…
This paper concerns the minimization of the composition of a nonsmooth convex function and a $\mathcal{C}^{1,1}$ mapping $F$ over a $\mathcal{C}^2$-smooth embedded closed submanifold $\mathcal{M}$. For this class of nonconvex and nonsmooth…
Our object of study is extremal functions which are defined by distance functions of convex bodies. These functions take values in the moduli spaces of algebraic and geometric objects associated with these ${\mathbb Z}$-modules (geometric…
We investigate a class of composite nonconvex functions, where the outer function is the sum of univariate extended-real-valued convex functions and the inner function is the limit of difference-of-convex functions. A notable feature of…
We seek to approximate a composite function h(x) = g(f(x)) with a global polynomial. The standard approach chooses points x in the domain of f and computes h(x) at each point, which requires an evaluation of f and an evaluation of g. We…
Machine learning algorithms typically perform optimization over a class of non-convex functions. In this work, we provide bounds on the fundamental hardness of identifying the global minimizer of a non convex function. Specifically, we…
Submodular Functions are a special class of set functions, which generalize several information-theoretic quantities such as entropy and mutual information [1]. Submodular functions have subgradients and subdifferentials [2] and admit…
The problem of maximizing non-negative submodular functions has been studied extensively in the last few years. However, most papers consider submodular set functions. Recently, several advances have been made for the more general case of…
The proximal point algorithm, which is a well-known tool for finding minima of convex functions, is generalized from the classical Hilbert space framework into a nonlinear setting, namely, geodesic metric spaces of nonpositive curvature. We…
We show that in finite-dimensional nonlinear approximations, the best $r$-term approximant of a function $f$ almost always exists over $\mathbb{C}$ but that the same is not true over $\mathbb{R}$, i.e., the infimum $\inf_{f_1,\dots,f_r \in…
Detecting hidden convexity is one of the tools to address nonconvex minimization problems. After giving a formal definition of hidden convexity, we introduce the notion of conditional infimum, as it will prove instrumental in detecting…