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Related papers: Optimization without Backpropagation

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We introduce algorithms that use predictions from machine learning applied to the input to circumvent worst-case analysis. We aim for algorithms that have near optimal performance when these predictions are good, but recover the…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2020-06-17 Michael Mitzenmacher , Sergei Vassilvitskii

Popular approaches for minimizing loss in data-driven learning often involve an abstraction or an explicit retention of the history of gradients for efficient parameter updates. The aggregated history of gradients nudges the parameter…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-06-22 Paul-Aymeric McRae , Prasanna Parthasarathi , Mahmoud Assran , Sarath Chandar

Approximation of subdifferentials is one of the main tasks when computing descent directions for nonsmooth optimization problems. In this article, we propose a bisection method for weakly lower semismooth functions which is able to compute…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-02-07 Bennet Gebken

Cardinality constraints in optimization are commonly of $L^0$-type, and they lead to sparsely supported optimizers. An efficient way of dealing with these constraints algorithmically, when the objective functional is convex, is…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2026-02-26 Bastian Dittrich , Evelyn Herberg , Roland Herzog , Georg Müller

We consider a class of optimization problems that involve determining the maximum value that a function in a particular class can attain subject to a collection of difference constraints. We show that a particular linear programming…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2022-11-16 Sungjin Im , Benjamin Moseley , Hung Q. Ngo , Kirk Pruhs , Alireza Samadian

Backpropagation, the cornerstone of deep learning, is limited to computing gradients for continuous variables. This limitation poses challenges for problems involving discrete latent variables. To address this issue, we propose a novel…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-10-17 Liyuan Liu , Chengyu Dong , Xiaodong Liu , Bin Yu , Jianfeng Gao

There is an increasing need in solving high-dimensional optimization problems under non-deterministic environment. The simultaneous perturbation stochastic approximation (SPSA) algorithm has recently attracted considerable attention for…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2020-12-15 Chen Wang

These notes focus on the minimization of convex functionals using first-order optimization methods, which are fundamental in many areas of applied mathematics and engineering. The primary goal of this document is to introduce and analyze…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-10-28 Charles Dossal , Samuel Hurault , Nicolas Papadakis

In this paper, we aim at providing an introduction to the gradient descent based optimization algorithms for learning deep neural network models. Deep learning models involving multiple nonlinear projection layers are very challenging to…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-03-12 Jiawei Zhang

Optimal transport distances have found many applications in machine learning for their capacity to compare non-parametric probability distributions. Yet their algorithmic complexity generally prevents their direct use on large scale…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-03-08 Kilian Fatras , Thibault Séjourné , Nicolas Courty , Rémi Flamary

Understanding how systems built out of modular components can be jointly optimized is an important problem in biology, engineering, and machine learning. The backpropagation algorithm is one such solution and has been instrumental in the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-03-05 Christian Pehle , Jean-Jacques Slotine

The research area of algorithms with predictions has seen recent success showing how to incorporate machine learning into algorithm design to improve performance when the predictions are correct, while retaining worst-case guarantees when…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-12-06 Michael Dinitz , Sungjin Im , Thomas Lavastida , Benjamin Moseley , Sergei Vassilvitskii

A common way of characterizing minimax estimators in point estimation is by moving the problem into the Bayesian estimation domain and finding a least favorable prior distribution. The Bayesian estimator induced by a least favorable prior,…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2022-02-24 Alex Dytso , Mario Goldenbaum , H. Vincent Poor , Shlomo Shamai

We present a new feasible proximal gradient method for constrained optimization where both the objective and constraint functions are given by the summation of a smooth, possibly nonconvex function and a convex simple function. The…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-02-01 Digvijay Boob , Qi Deng , Guanghui Lan

Numerous Optimization Algorithms have a time-varying update rule thanks to, for instance, a changing step size, momentum parameter or, Hessian approximation. In this paper, we apply unrolled or automatic differentiation to a time-varying…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-10-28 Sheheryar Mehmood , Peter Ochs

Selecting an optimizer is a central step in the contemporary deep learning pipeline. In this paper, we demonstrate the sensitivity of optimizer comparisons to the hyperparameter tuning protocol. Our findings suggest that the hyperparameter…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-06-17 Dami Choi , Christopher J. Shallue , Zachary Nado , Jaehoon Lee , Chris J. Maddison , George E. Dahl

We propose a novel family of decision-aware surrogate losses, called Perturbation Gradient (PG) losses, for the predict-then-optimize framework. The key idea is to connect the expected downstream decision loss with the directional…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-11-01 Michael Huang , Vishal Gupta

With the success that the field of bilevel optimization has seen in recent years, similar methodologies have started being applied to solving more difficult applications that arise in trilevel optimization. At the helm of these applications…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2025-05-13 Tommaso Giovannelli , Griffin Dean Kent , Luis Nunes Vicente

In this paper, we propose a random gradient-free method for optimization in infinite dimensional Hilbert spaces, applicable to functional optimization in diverse settings. Though such problems are often solved through finite-dimensional…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2025-12-25 Caio Lins Peixoto , Daniel Csillag , Bernardo F. P. da Costa , Yuri F. Saporito

Achieving robust control and optimization in high-fidelity physics simulations is extremely challenging, especially for evolutionary systems whose solutions span vast scales across space, time, and physical variables. In conjunction with…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2025-05-29 Brian K. Tran , Ben S. Southworth , Hannah F. Blumhoefer , Samuel Olivier