Related papers: High-Probability Guarantees for Random Zeroth-Orde…
In this paper we consider stochastic composite convex optimization problems with the objective function satisfying a stochastic bounded gradient condition, with or without a quadratic functional growth property. These models include the…
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…
Some variant of the Frank-Wolfe method for convex optimization problems with adaptive selection of the step parameter corresponding to information about the smoothness of the objective function (the Lipschitz constant of the gradient).…
This work considers the question: what convergence guarantees does the stochastic subgradient method have in the absence of smoothness and convexity? We prove that the stochastic subgradient method, on any semialgebraic locally Lipschitz…
We study the class of subdifferentially polynomially bounded (SPB) functions, which is a rich class of locally Lipschitz functions that encompasses all Lipschitz functions, all gradient- or Hessian-Lipschitz functions, and even some…
In this paper, we discuss the problem of minimizing the sum of two convex functions: a smooth function plus a non-smooth function. Further, the smooth part can be expressed by the average of a large number of smooth component functions, and…
First order methods endowed with global convergence guarantees operate using global lower bounds on the objective. The tightening of the bounds has been shown to increase both the theoretical guarantees and the practical performance. In…
In this paper, we present a stochastic gradient algorithm for minimizing a smooth objective function that is an expectation over noisy cost samples, and only the latter are observed for any given parameter. Our algorithm employs a gradient…
Dual first-order methods are powerful techniques for large-scale convex optimization. Although an extensive research effort has been devoted to studying their convergence properties, explicit convergence rates for the primal iterates have…
Higher-order tensor methods were recently proposed for minimizing smooth convex and nonconvex functions. Higher-order algorithms accelerate the convergence of the classical first-order methods thanks to the higher-order derivatives used in…
We develop a new primitive for stochastic optimization: a low-bias, low-cost estimator of the minimizer $x_\star$ of any Lipschitz strongly-convex function. In particular, we use a multilevel Monte-Carlo approach due to Blanchet and Glynn…
We study differentiable strongly quasiconvex functions for providing new properties for algorithmic and monotonicity purposes. Furthemore, we provide insights into the decreasing behaviour of strongly quasiconvex functions, applying this…
This paper develops negative curvature methods for continuous nonlinear unconstrained optimization in stochastic settings, in which function, gradient, and Hessian information is available only through probabilistic oracles, i.e., oracles…
We study robust Markov decision processes (RMDPs) with general policy parameterization under s-rectangular and non-rectangular uncertainty sets. Prior work is largely limited to tabular policies, and hence either lacks sample complexity…
Composite optimization problems, where the sum of a smooth and a merely lower semicontinuous function has to be minimized, are often tackled numerically by means of proximal gradient methods as soon as the lower semicontinuous part of the…
We consider the closely related problems of bandit convex optimization with two-point feedback, and zero-order stochastic convex optimization with two function evaluations per round. We provide a simple algorithm and analysis which is…
The minimization of convex functions which are only available through partial and noisy information is a key methodological problem in many disciplines. In this paper we consider convex optimization with noisy zero-th order information,…
We propose a descent subgradient algorithm for minimizing a real function, assumed to be locally Lipschitz, but not necessarily smooth or convex. To find an effective descent direction, the Goldstein subdifferential is approximated through…
We develop a line-search second-order algorithmic framework for minimizing finite sums. We do not make any convexity assumptions, but require the terms of the sum to be continuously differentiable and have Lipschitz-continuous gradients.…
In monotone submodular function maximization, approximation guarantees based on the curvature of the objective function have been extensively studied in the literature. However, the notion of curvature is often pessimistic, and we rarely…