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Motivated by penalized likelihood maximization in complex models, we study optimization problems where neither the function to optimize nor its gradient have an explicit expression, but its gradient can be approximated by a Monte Carlo…
Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) method is popular for solving non-convex optimization problems in machine learning. This work investigates SGD from a viewpoint of graduated optimization, which is a widely applied approach for non-convex…
We propose an online learning algorithm for a class of machine learning models under a separable stochastic approximation framework. The essence of our idea lies in the observation that certain parameters in the models are easier to…
Optimization problems with continuous data appear in, e.g., robust machine learning, functional data analysis, and variational inference. Here, the target function is given as an integral over a family of (continuously) indexed target…
We consider the problem of solving robust Markov decision process (MDP), which involves a set of discounted, finite state, finite action space MDPs with uncertain transition kernels. The goal of planning is to find a robust policy that…
Models incorporating uncertain inputs, such as random forces or material parameters, have been of increasing interest in PDE-constrained optimization. In this paper, we focus on the efficient numerical minimization of a convex and smooth…
We consider a generic empirical composition optimization problem, where there are empirical averages present both outside and inside nonlinear loss functions. Such a problem is of interest in various machine learning applications, and…
In this work and its accompanying Part II [1], we develop an accelerated algorithmic framework, DAMA (Decentralized Accelerated Minimax Approach), for nonconvex Polyak-Lojasiewicz minimax optimization over decentralized multi-agent…
The challenging problem of conducting fully Bayesian inference for the reaction rate constants governing stochastic kinetic models (SKMs) is considered. Given the challenges underlying this problem, the Markov jump process representation is…
Gradient-based minimax optimal algorithms have greatly promoted the development of continuous optimization and machine learning. One seminal work due to Yurii Nesterov [Nes83a] established $\tilde{\mathcal{O}}(\sqrt{L/\mu})$ gradient…
Stochastic optimization is a widely used approach for optimization under uncertainty, where uncertain input parameters are modeled by random variables. Exact or approximation algorithms have been obtained for several fundamental problems in…
In this paper, we propose a stochastic Gauss-Newton (SGN) algorithm to study the online principal component analysis (OPCA) problem, which is formulated by using the symmetric low-rank product (SLRP) model for dominant eigenspace…
An algorithm is presented for momentum gradient descent optimization based on the first-order differential equation of the Newtonian dynamics. The fictitious mass is introduced to the dynamics of momentum for regularizing the adaptive…
Many machine learning and optimization algorithms can be cast as instances of stochastic approximation (SA). The convergence rate of these algorithms is known to be slow, with the optimal mean squared error (MSE) of order $O(n^{-1})$. In…
Motivated by problems from neuroimaging in which existing approaches make use of "mass univariate" analysis which neglects spatial structure entirely, but the full joint modelling of all quantities of interest is computationally infeasible,…
Rapid advances in data collection and processing capabilities have allowed for the use of increasingly complex models that give rise to nonconvex optimization problems. These formulations, however, can be arbitrarily difficult to solve in…
Topology optimization under uncertainty (TOuU) often defines objectives and constraints by statistical moments of geometric and physical quantities of interest. Most traditional TOuU methods use gradient-based optimization algorithms and…
Derivative-free optimization (DFO) is vital in solving complex optimization problems where only noisy function evaluations are available through an oracle. Within this domain, DFO via finite difference (FD) approximation has emerged as a…
A framework previously introduced in [3] for solving a sequence of stochastic optimization problems with bounded changes in the minimizers is extended and applied to machine learning problems such as regression and classification. The…
First-order stochastic methods are the state-of-the-art in large-scale machine learning optimization owing to efficient per-iteration complexity. Second-order methods, while able to provide faster convergence, have been much less explored…