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Chance-constrained problems involve stochastic components in the constraints which can be violated with a small probability. We investigate the impact of different types of chance constraints on the performance of iterative search…
Motivated by applications in reinforcement learning (RL), we study a nonlinear stochastic approximation (SA) algorithm under Markovian noise, and establish its finite-sample convergence bounds under various stepsizes. Specifically, we show…
We provide tight finite-time convergence bounds for gradient descent and stochastic gradient descent on quadratic functions, when the gradients are delayed and reflect iterates from $\tau$ rounds ago. First, we show that without stochastic…
We consider stochastic approximations which arise from such applications as data communications and image processing. We demonstrate why constraints are needed in a stochastic approximation and how a constrained approximation can be…
Motivated by emerging applications in machine learning, we consider an optimization problem in a general form where the gradient of the objective function is available through a biased stochastic oracle. We assume a bias-control parameter…
This article deals with stochastic processes endowed with the Markov (memoryless) property and evolving over general (uncountable) state spaces. The models further depend on a non-deterministic quantity in the form of a control input, which…
Stochastic iterative methods are useful in a variety of large-scale numerical linear algebraic, machine learning, and statistical problems, in part due to their low-memory footprint. They are frequently used in a variety of applications,…
We study gradient descent (GD) with a constant stepsize for $\ell_2$-regularized logistic regression with linearly separable data. Classical theory suggests small stepsizes to ensure monotonic reduction of the optimization objective,…
Classical stochastic gradient methods are well suited for minimizing expected-value objective functions. However, they do not apply to the minimization of a nonlinear function involving expected values or a composition of two expected-value…
This paper considers a distributed stochastic strongly convex optimization, where agents connected over a network aim to cooperatively minimize the average of all agents' local cost functions. Due to the stochasticity of gradient estimation…
In this paper, we study the convergence properties of the Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD) method for finding a stationary point of a given objective function $J(\cdot)$. The objective function is not required to be convex. Rather, our…
To deal with very large datasets a mini-batch version of the Monte Carlo Markov Chain Stochastic Approximation Expectation-Maximization algorithm for general latent variable models is proposed. For exponential models the algorithm is shown…
In this paper we consider convex optimization problems with stochastic composite objective function subject to (possibly) infinite intersection of constraints. The objective function is expressed in terms of expectation operator over a sum…
Stochastic saddle point (SSP) problems are, in general, less studied compared to stochastic minimization problems. However, SSP problems emerge from machine learning (adversarial training, e.g., GAN, AUC maximization), statistics (robust…
Optimal experimental design (OED) seeks experiments expected to yield the most useful data for some purpose. In practical circumstances where experiments are time-consuming or resource-intensive, OED can yield enormous savings. We pursue…
Stochastic nonconvex optimization problems with nonlinear constraints have a broad range of applications in intelligent transportation, cyber-security, and smart grids. In this paper, first, we propose an inexact-proximal accelerated…
We consider the problem of minimizing the sum of two convex functions: one is the average of a large number of smooth component functions, and the other is a general convex function that admits a simple proximal mapping. We assume the whole…
In this paper, a distributed stochastic approximation algorithm is studied. Applications of such algorithms include decentralized estimation, optimization, control or computing. The algorithm consists in two steps: a local step, where each…
We propose an extragradient method with stepsizes bounded away from zero for stochastic variational inequalities requiring only pseudo-monotonicity. We provide convergence and complexity analysis, allowing for an unbounded feasible set,…
The theory of stochastic approximations form the theoretical foundation for studying convergence properties of many popular recursive learning algorithms in statistics, machine learning and statistical physics. Large deviations for…