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In this work, we consider strongly convex strongly concave (SCSC) saddle point (SP) problems $\min_{x\in\mathbb{R}^{d_x}}\max_{y\in\mathbb{R}^{d_y}}f(x,y)$ where $f$ is $L$-smooth, $f(.,y)$ is $\mu$-strongly convex for every $y$, and…
We analyze the behavior of randomized coordinate gradient descent for nonconvex optimization, proving that under standard assumptions, the iterates almost surely escape strict saddle points. By formulating the method as a nonlinear random…
Most algorithms for solving optimization problems or finding saddle points of convex-concave functions are fixed-point algorithms. In this work we consider the generic problem of finding a fixed point of an average of operators, or an…
We consider the smooth convex-concave bilinearly-coupled saddle-point problem, $\min_{\mathbf{x}}\max_{\mathbf{y}}~F(\mathbf{x}) + H(\mathbf{x},\mathbf{y}) - G(\mathbf{y})$, where one has access to stochastic first-order oracles for $F$,…
Recently, the problem of local minima in very high dimensional non-convex optimization has been challenged and the problem of saddle points has been introduced. This paper introduces a dynamic type of normalization that forces the system to…
In this paper, we study the gradient descent-ascent method for convex-concave saddle-point problems. We derive a new non-asymptotic global convergence rate in terms of distance to the solution set by using the semidefinite programming…
We study solution methods for (strongly-)convex-(strongly)-concave Saddle-Point Problems (SPPs) over networks of two type - master/workers (thus centralized) architectures and meshed (thus decentralized) networks. The local functions at…
Recent focus on robustness to adversarial attacks for deep neural networks produced a large variety of algorithms for training robust models. Most of the effective algorithms involve solving the min-max optimization problem for training…
In centralized settings, it is well known that stochastic gradient descent (SGD) avoids saddle points and converges to local minima in nonconvex problems. However, similar guarantees are lacking for distributed first-order algorithms. The…
In this work, we analyze the global convergence property of coordinate gradient descent with random choice of coordinates and stepsizes for non-convex optimization problems. Under generic assumptions, we prove that the algorithm iterate…
Gradient descent (GD) and stochastic gradient descent (SGD) are the workhorses of large-scale machine learning. While classical theory focused on analyzing the performance of these methods in convex optimization problems, the most notable…
We study non-smooth stochastic decentralized optimization problems over time-varying networks, where objective functions are distributed across nodes and network connections may intermittently appear or break. Specifically, we consider two…
In this paper we propose a primal-dual proximal extragradient algorithm to solve the generalized Dantzig selector (GDS) estimation problem, based on a new convex-concave saddle-point (SP) reformulation. Our new formulation makes it possible…
A central challenge to many fields of science and engineering involves minimizing non-convex error functions over continuous, high dimensional spaces. Gradient descent or quasi-Newton methods are almost ubiquitously used to perform such…
This paper focuses on stochastic saddle point problems with decision-dependent distributions. These are problems whose objective is the expected value of a stochastic payoff function and whose data distribution drifts in response to…
In this work, we conduct the first systematic study of stochastic variational inequality (SVI) and stochastic saddle point (SSP) problems under the constraint of differential privacy (DP). We propose two algorithms: Noisy Stochastic…
In this paper, we study the problem of escaping from saddle points in smooth nonconvex optimization problems subject to a convex set $\mathcal{C}$. We propose a generic framework that yields convergence to a second-order stationary point of…
Saddle points provide a hierarchical view of the energy landscape, revealing transition pathways and interconnected basins of attraction, and offering insight into the global structure, metastability, and possible collective mechanisms of…
In this paper, we introduce a multilevel algorithm for approximating variational formulations of symmetric saddle point systems. The algorithm is based on availability of families of stable finite element pairs and on the availability of…
We present a comprehensive theoretical analysis of first-order methods for escaping strict saddle points in smooth non-convex optimization. Our main contribution is a Perturbed Saddle-escape Descent (PSD) algorithm with fully explicit…