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In this paper, we propose and analyze zeroth-order stochastic approximation algorithms for nonconvex and convex optimization, with a focus on addressing constrained optimization, high-dimensional setting and saddle-point avoiding. To handle…
We present two stochastic descent algorithms that apply to unconstrained optimization and are particularly efficient when the objective function is slow to evaluate and gradients are not easily obtained, as in some PDE-constrained…
We propose new continuous-time formulations for first-order stochastic optimization algorithms such as mini-batch gradient descent and variance-reduced methods. We exploit these continuous-time models, together with simple Lyapunov analysis…
Advanced inventory management in complex supply chains requires effective and robust nonlinear optimization due to the stochastic nature of supply and demand variations. Application of estimated gradients can boost up the convergence of…
A framework is introduced for solving a sequence of slowly changing optimization problems, including those arising in regression and classification applications, using optimization algorithms such as stochastic gradient descent (SGD). The…
Stochastic optimization algorithms update models with cheap per-iteration costs sequentially, which makes them amenable for large-scale data analysis. Such algorithms have been widely studied for structured sparse models where the sparsity…
This paper studies the complexity of finding an $\epsilon$-stationary point for stochastic bilevel optimization when the upper-level problem is nonconvex and the lower-level problem is strongly convex. Recent work proposed the first-order…
We consider a two-stage stochastic optimization problem, in which a long-term optimization variable is coupled with a set of short-term optimization variables in both objective and constraint functions. Despite that two-stage stochastic…
Stochastic gradient Markov chain Monte Carlo (SG-MCMC) has been increasingly popular in Bayesian learning due to its ability to deal with large data. A standard SG-MCMC algorithm simulates samples from a discretized-time Markov chain to…
Gradient compression is of growing interests for solving constrained optimization problems including compressed sensing, noisy recovery and matrix completion under limited communication resources and storage costs. Convergence analysis of…
This paper focuses on solving a stochastic saddle point problem (SPP) under an overparameterized regime for the case, when the gradient computation is impractical. As an intermediate step, we generalize Same-sample Stochastic Extra-gradient…
Spanning tree problems with specialized constraints can be difficult to solve in real-world scenarios, often requiring intricate algorithmic design and exponential time. Recently, there has been growing interest in end-to-end deep neural…
In recent studies, line search methods have been demonstrated to significantly enhance the performance of conventional stochastic gradient descent techniques across various datasets and architectures, while making an otherwise critical…
This paper considers convex optimization problems where nodes of a network have access to summands of a global objective. Each of these local objectives is further assumed to be an average of a finite set of functions. The motivation for…
Finding effective ways to exploit parallel computing to accelerate Markov chain Monte Carlo methods is an important problem in Bayesian computation and related disciplines. In this paper, we consider the zeroth-order setting where the…
Stochastic gradient descent is a canonical tool for addressing stochastic optimization problems, and forms the bedrock of modern machine learning and statistics. In this work, we seek to balance the fact that attenuating step-size is…
We consider Markov Decision Problems defined over continuous state and action spaces, where an autonomous agent seeks to learn a map from its states to actions so as to maximize its long-term discounted accumulation of rewards. We address…
Despite an extensive body of literature on deep learning optimization, our current understanding of what makes an optimization algorithm effective is fragmented. In particular, we do not understand well whether enhanced optimization…
We consider expected risk minimization problems when the range of the estimator is required to be nonnegative, motivated by the settings of maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) and trajectory optimization. To facilitate nonlinear…
This paper concerns quasi-stochastic approximation (QSA) to solve root finding problems commonly found in applications to optimization and reinforcement learning. The general constant gain algorithm may be expressed as the…