Related papers: Sharp Analysis of Stochastic Optimization under Gl…
This paper addresses the study of derivative-free smooth optimization problems, where the gradient information on the objective function is unavailable. Two novel general derivative-free methods are proposed and developed for minimizing…
We analyze stochastic gradient algorithms for optimizing nonconvex, nonsmooth finite-sum problems. In particular, the objective function is given by the summation of a differentiable (possibly nonconvex) component, together with a possibly…
In this thesis, I study the minimax oracle complexity of distributed stochastic optimization. First, I present the "graph oracle model", an extension of the classic oracle complexity framework that can be applied to study distributed…
Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD) is a known stochastic iterative method popular for large-scale convex optimization problems due to its simple implementation and scalability. Some objectives, such as those found in complex-valued neural…
We study a class of nonconvex-nonconcave minimax problems in which the inner maximization problem satisfies a local Kurdyka-Lojasiewicz (KL) condition that may vary with the outer minimization variable. In contrast to the global KL or…
We develop universal gradient methods for Stochastic Convex Optimization (SCO). Our algorithms automatically adapt not only to the oracle's noise but also to the H\"older smoothness of the objective function without a priori knowledge of…
Stochastic Gradient (SG) is the defacto iterative technique to solve stochastic optimization (SO) problems with a smooth (non-convex) objective $f$ and a stochastic first-order oracle. SG's attractiveness is due in part to its simplicity of…
Dual averaging and gradient descent with their stochastic variants stand as the two canonical recipe books for first-order optimization: Every modern variant can be viewed as a descendant of one or the other. In the convex regime, these…
We develop a class of algorithms, as variants of the stochastically controlled stochastic gradient (SCSG) methods (Lei and Jordan, 2016), for the smooth non-convex finite-sum optimization problem. Assuming the smoothness of each component,…
Nonconvex-nonconcave minimax optimization has gained widespread interest over the last decade. However, most existing works focus on variants of gradient descent-ascent (GDA) algorithms, which are only applicable to smooth nonconvex-concave…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) has been a go-to algorithm for nonconvex stochastic optimization problems arising in machine learning. Its theory however often requires a strong framework to guarantee convergence properties. We hereby…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) is one of the most popular algorithms in modern machine learning. The noise encountered in these applications is different from that in many theoretical analyses of stochastic gradient algorithms. In this…
In this paper, we give a sharp analysis for Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD) and prove that SGD is able to efficiently escape from saddle points and find an $(\epsilon, O(\epsilon^{0.5}))$-approximate second-order stationary point in…
In this paper, we investigate the problem of stochastic multi-level compositional optimization, where the objective function is a composition of multiple smooth but possibly non-convex functions. Existing methods for solving this problem…
We revisit the classical problem of finding an approximately stationary point of the average of $n$ smooth and possibly nonconvex functions. The optimal complexity of stochastic first-order methods in terms of the number of gradient…
We introduce a hybrid stochastic estimator to design stochastic gradient algorithms for solving stochastic optimization problems. Such a hybrid estimator is a convex combination of two existing biased and unbiased estimators and leads to…
The distributed nonconvex optimization problem of minimizing a global cost function formed by a sum of $n$ local cost functions by using local information exchange is considered. This problem is an important component of many machine…
Minimization of a smooth function on a sphere or, more generally, on a smooth manifold, is the simplest non-convex optimization problem. It has a lot of applications. Our goal is to propose a version of the gradient projection algorithm for…
We study the convergence properties of a general inertial first-order proximal splitting algorithm for solving nonconvex nonsmooth optimization problems. Using the Kurdyka--\L ojaziewicz (KL) inequality we establish new convergence rates…
This paper addresses the generalized descent algorithm (DEAL) for minimizing smooth functions, which is analyzed under the Kurdyka-{\L}ojasiewicz (KL) inequality. In particular, the suggested algorithm guarantees a sufficient decrease by…