In this paper, two new subspace minimization conjugate gradient methods based on $p - $regularization models are proposed, where a special scaled norm in $p - $regularization model is analyzed. Different choices for special scaled norm lead to different solutions to the $p - $regularized subproblem. Based on the analyses of the solutions in a two-dimensional subspace, we derive new directions satisfying the sufficient descent condition. With a modified nonmonotone line search, we establish the global convergence of the proposed methods under mild assumptions. $R - $linear convergence of the proposed methods are also analyzed. Numerical results show that, for the CUTEr library, the proposed methods are superior to four conjugate gradient methods, which were proposed by Hager and Zhang (SIAM J Optim 16(1):170-192, 2005), Dai and Kou (SIAM J Optim 23(1):296-320, 2013), Liu and Liu (J Optim Theory Appl 180(3):879-906, 2019) and Li et al. (Comput Appl Math 38(1): 2019), respectively.
In this paper, based on the limited memory techniques and subspace minimization conjugate gradient (SMCG) methods, a regularized limited memory subspace minimization conjugate gradient method is proposed, which contains two types of iterations. In SMCG iteration, we obtain the search direction by minimizing the approximate quadratic model or approximate regularization model. In RQN iteration, combined with regularization technique and BFGS method, a modified regularized quasi-Newton method is used in the subspace to improve the orthogonality. Moreover, some simple acceleration criteria and an …
We suggest a conjugate subgradient type method without any line-search for minimization of convex non differentiable functions. Unlike the custom methods of this class, it does not require monotone decrease of the goal function and reduces the implementation cost of each iteration essentially. At the same time, its step-size procedure takes into account behavior of the method along the iteration points. Preliminary results of computational experiments confirm efficiency of the proposed modification.
A formula for the sub\-differential of the sum of a series of convex functions defined on a Banach space was provided by X. Y. Zheng in 1998. In this paper, besides a slight extension to locally convex spaces of Zheng's results, we provide a formula for the conjugate of a countable sum of convex functions. Then we use these results for calculating the sub\-differentials and the conjugates in two situations related to entropy minimization, and we study a concrete example met in Statistical Physics.
Subspace minimization conjugate gradient (SMCG) methods have become a class of quite efficient iterative methods for unconstrained optimization and have attracted extensive attention recently. Usually, the search directions of SMCG methods are generated by minimizing approximate models with the approximation matrix $ B_k $ of the objective function at the current iterate over the subspace spanned by the current gradient $ g_k $ and the latest search direction. The $ g_k^TB_kg_k $ must be estimated properly in the calculation of the search directions, which is crucial to the theoretical propert…
In this paper we consider the unconstrained minimization problem of a smooth function in ${\mathbb{R}}^n$ in a setting where only function evaluations are possible. We design a novel randomized derivative-free algorithm --- the stochastic three points (STP) method --- and analyze its iteration complexity. At each iteration, STP generates a random search direction according to a certain fixed probability law. Our assumptions on this law are very mild: roughly speaking, all laws which do not concentrate all measure on any halfspace passing through the origin will work. For instance, we allow for…
We consider minimization of a smooth nonconvex objective function using an iterative algorithm based on Newton's method and the linear conjugate gradient algorithm, with explicit detection and use of negative curvature directions for the Hessian of the objective function. The algorithm tracks Newton-conjugate gradient procedures developed in the 1980s closely, but includes enhancements that allow worst-case complexity results to be proved for convergence to points that satisfy approximate first-order and second-order optimality conditions. The complexity results match the best known results in…
We consider the problem of minimizing a polynomial function over the integer lattice. Though impossible in general, we use a known sufficient condition for the existence of continuous minimizers to guarantee the existence of integer minimizers as well. In case this condition holds, we use sos programming to compute the radius of a p-norm ball which contains all integer minimizers. We prove that this radius is smaller than the radius known from the literature. Furthermore, we derive a new class of underestimators of the polynomial function. Using a Stellensatz from real algebraic geometry and a…
We propose a method for low-rank semidefinite programming in application to the semidefinite relaxation of unconstrained binary quadratic problems. The method improves an existing solution of the semidefinite programming relaxation to achieve a lower rank solution. This procedure is computationally efficient as it does not require projecting on the cone of positive-semidefinite matrices. Its performance in terms of objective improvement and rank reduction is tested over multiple graphs of large-scale Gset graph collection and over binary optimization problems from the Biq Mac collection.
This paper gives a unified and succinct approach to the $O(1/\sqrt{k}), O(1/k),$ and $O(1/k^2)$ convergence rates of the subgradient, gradient, and accelerated gradient methods for unconstrained convex minimization. In the three cases the proof of convergence follows from a generic bound defined by the convex conjugate of the objective function.
In this work, we propose an adaptive variation on the classical Heavy-ball method for convex quadratic minimization. The adaptivity crucially relies on so-called "Polyak step-sizes", which consists in using the knowledge of the optimal value of the optimization problem at hand instead of problem parameters such as a few eigenvalues of the Hessian of the problem. This method happens to also be equivalent to a variation of the classical conjugate gradient method, and thereby inherits many of its attractive features, including its finite-time convergence, instance optimality, and its worst-case c…
Mohammed VI Polytechnic University（穆罕默德六世理工大学）；King Abdullah University of Science and Technology（阿卜杜拉国王科技大学）
In this paper, we propose a new zero order optimization method called minibatch stochastic three points (MiSTP) method to solve an unconstrained minimization problem in a setting where only an approximation of the objective function evaluation is possible. It is based on the recently proposed stochastic three points (STP) method (Bergou et al., 2020). At each iteration, MiSTP generates a random search direction in a similar manner to STP, but chooses the next iterate based solely on the approximation of the objective function rather than its exact evaluations. We also analyze our method's comp…
By applying the perturbation function approach, we propose the Lagrangian and the conjugate duals for minimization problems of the sum of two, generally nonconvex, functions. The main tools are the $Φ$-convexity theory and minimax theorems for $Φ$-convex functions. We provide conditions ensuring zero duality gap and introduce $Φ$-Karush-Kuhn-Tucker conditions that characterize solutions to primal and dual problems. We also discuss the relationship between the dual problems introduced in the present investigation and some conjugate-type duals existing in the literature.
In this paper, an efficient modified Newton type algorithm is proposed for nonlinear unconstrianed optimization problems. The modified Hessian is a convex combination of the identity matrix (for steepest descent algorithm) and the Hessian matrix (for Newton algorithm). The coefficients of the convex combination are dynamically chosen in every iteration. The algorithm is proved to be globally and quadratically convergent for (convex and nonconvex) nonlinear functions. Efficient implementation is described. Numerical test on widely used CUTE test problems is conducted for the new algorithm. The …
In this paper we study general $l_p$ regularized unconstrained minimization problems. In particular, we derive lower bounds for nonzero entries of first- and second-order stationary points, and hence also of local minimizers of the $l_p$ minimization problems. We extend some existing iterative reweighted $l_1$ (IRL1) and $l_2$ (IRL2) minimization methods to solve these problems and proposed new variants for them in which each subproblem has a closed form solution. Also, we provide a unified convergence analysis for these methods. In addition, we propose a novel Lipschitz continuous $ε$-approxi…
We give a novel proof of the $O(1/k)$ and $O(1/k^2)$ convergence rates of the proximal gradient and accelerated proximal gradient methods for composite convex minimization. The crux of the new proof is an upper bound constructed via the convex conjugate of the objective function.
Submodular function minimization is well studied, and existing algorithms solve it exactly or up to arbitrary accuracy. However, in many applications, such as structured sparse learning or batch Bayesian optimization, the objective function is not exactly submodular, but close. In this case, no theoretical guarantees exist. Indeed, submodular minimization algorithms rely on intricate connections between submodularity and convexity. We show how these relations can be extended to obtain approximation guarantees for minimizing non-submodular functions, characterized by how close the function is t…
This paper considers the fixed point problem for a nonexpansive mapping on a real Hilbert space and proposes novel line search fixed point algorithms to accelerate the search. The termination conditions for the line search are based on the well-known Wolfe conditions that are used to ensure the convergence and stability of unconstrained optimization algorithms. The directions to search for fixed points are generated by using the ideas of the steepest descent direction and conventional nonlinear conjugate gradient directions for unconstrained optimization. We perform convergence as well as conv…
This paper presents new Riemannian conjugate gradient methods and global convergence analyses under the strong Wolfe conditions. The main idea of the new methods is to combine the good global convergence properties of the Dai-Yuan method with the efficient numerical performance of the Hestenes-Stiefel method. The proposed methods compare well numerically with the existing methods for the Rayleigh quotient minimization problem on the unit sphere. Numerical comparisons show that they perform better than the existing ones.
It is widely accepted that the stepsize is of great significance to gradient method. Two efficient gradient methods with approximately optimal stepsizes mainly based on regularization models are proposed for unconstrained optimization. More exactly, if the objective function is not close to a quadratic function on the line segment between the current and latest iterates, regularization models are exploited carefully to generate approximately optimal stepsizes. Otherwise, quadratic approximation models are used. In particular, when the curvature is non-positive, special regularization models ar…
On the convergence of orthogonalization-free conjugate gradient method for extreme eigenvalues of Hermitian matrices: a Riemannian optimization interpretation
UW-Madison（威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校）；University of Chicago（芝加哥大学）
This note provides a novel, simple analysis of the method of conjugate gradients for the minimization of convex quadratic functions. In contrast with standard arguments, our proof is entirely self-contained and does not rely on the existence of Chebyshev polynomials. Another advantage of our development is that it clarifies the relation between the method of conjugate gradients and general accelerated methods for smooth minimization by unifying their analyses within the framework of the Approximate Duality Gap Technique that was introduced by the authors.
A new type of stepsize, which was recently introduced by Liu and Liu (Optimization, 67(3), 427-440, 2018), is called approximately optimal stepsize and is quit efficient for gradient method. Interestingly, all gradient methods can be regarded as gradient methods with approximately optimal stepsizes. In this paper, based on the work (Numer. Algorithms 78(1), 21-39, 2018), we present an improved gradient method with approximately optimal stepsize based on conic model for unconstrained optimization. If the objective function $ f $ is not close to a quadratic on the line segment between the curren…
This article deals with the conjugate gradient method on a Riemannian manifold with interest in global convergence analysis. The existing conjugate gradient algorithms on a manifold endowed with a vector transport need the assumption that the vector transport does not increase the norm of tangent vectors, in order to confirm that generated sequences have a global convergence property. In this article, the notion of a scaled vector transport is introduced to improve the algorithm so that the generated sequences may have a global convergence property under a relaxed assumption. In the proposed a…
We introduce new optimized first-order methods for smooth unconstrained convex minimization. Drori and Teboulle recently described a numerical method for computing the $N$-iteration optimal step coefficients in a class of first-order algorithms that includes gradient methods, heavy-ball methods, and Nesterov's fast gradient methods. However, Drori and Teboulle's numerical method is computationally expensive for large $N$, and the corresponding numerically optimized first-order algorithm requires impractical memory and computation for large-scale optimization problems. In this paper, we propose…
This paper describes an extension of the BFGS and L-BFGS methods for the minimization of a nonlinear function subject to errors. This work is motivated by applications that contain computational noise, employ low-precision arithmetic, or are subject to statistical noise. The classical BFGS and L-BFGS methods can fail in such circumstances because the updating procedure can be corrupted and the line search can behave erratically. The proposed method addresses these difficulties and ensures that the BFGS update is stable by employing a lengthening procedure that spaces out the points at which gr…
A q-Gauss-Newton algorithm is an iterative procedure that solves nonlinear unconstrained optimization problems based on minimization of the sum squared errors of the objective function residuals. Main advantage of the algorithm is that it approximates matrix of q-second order derivatives with the first-order q-Jacobian matrix. For that reason, the algorithm is much faster than q-steepest descent algorithms. The convergence of q-GN method is assured only when the initial guess is close enough to the solution. In this paper the influence of the parameter q to the non-linear problem solving is pr…
In this paper, we propose a new non-monotone conjugate gradient method for solving unconstrained nonlinear optimization problems. We first modify the non-monotone line search method by introducing a new trigonometric function to calculate the non-monotone parameter, which plays an essential role in the algorithm's efficiency. Then, we apply a convex combination of the Barzilai-Borwein method for calculating the value of step size in each iteration. Under some suitable assumptions, we prove that the new algorithm has the global convergence property. The efficiency and effectiveness of the propo…
An Approximate Conjugate Subgradient Algorithm with Matrix Parameter for Derivative-Free Nonsmooth Optimization Problems
Fakultät für Mathematik, Universität Wien（维也纳大学）；Faculty of Engineering, Free University of Bozen–Bolzano（博岑-博尔扎诺自由大学）；Université Catholique de Louvain (UCLouvain)（天主教鲁汶大学）
In this paper, an exact algorithm in polynomial time is developed to solve unrestricted binary quadratic programs. The computational complexity is $O\left( n^{\frac{15}{2}}\right) $, although very conservative, it is sufficient to prove that this minimization problem is in the complexity class $P$. The implementation aspects are also described in detail with a special emphasis on the transformation of the quadratic program into a linear program that can be solved in polynomial time. The algorithm was implemented in MATLAB and checked by generating five million matrices of arbitrary dimensions …
We introduce a novel approach for analyzing the performance of first-order black-box optimization methods. We focus on smooth unconstrained convex minimization over the Euclidean space $R^d$. Our approach relies on the observation that by definition, the worst case behavior of a black-box optimization method is by itself an optimization problem, which we call the Performance Estimation Problem (PEP). We formulate and analyze the PEP for two classes of first-order algorithms. We first apply this approach on the classical gradient method and derive a new and tight analytical bound on its perform…
We investigate the unconstrained global optimization of functions with low effective dimensionality, that are constant along certain (unknown) linear subspaces. Extending the technique of random subspace embeddings in [Wang et al., Bayesian optimization in a billion dimensions via random embeddings. JAIR, 55(1): 361--387, 2016], we study a generic Random Embeddings for Global Optimization (REGO) framework that is compatible with any global minimization algorithm. Instead of the original, potentially large-scale optimization problem, within REGO, a Gaussian random, low-dimensional problem with …
The reconstruction of low-rank matrix from its noisy observation finds its usage in many applications. It can be reformulated into a constrained nuclear norm minimization problem, where the bound $η$ of the constraint is explicitly given or can be estimated by the probability distribution of the noise. When the Lagrangian method is applied to find the minimizer, the solution can be obtained by the singular value thresholding operator where the thresholding parameter $λ$ is related to the Lagrangian multiplier. In this paper, we first show that the Frobenius norm of the discrepancy between the …
In this paper, we consider optimization problems over closed embedded submanifolds of $\mathbb{R}^n$, which are defined by the constraints $c(x) = 0$. We propose a class of constraint dissolving approaches for these Riemannian optimization problems. In these proposed approaches, solving a Riemannian optimization problem is transferred into the unconstrained minimization of a constraint dissolving function named CDF. Different from existing exact penalty functions, the exact gradient and Hessian of CDF are easy to compute. We study the theoretical properties of CDF and prove that the original p…
