49,545 research outputs found
Successive Convex Approximation Algorithms for Sparse Signal Estimation with Nonconvex Regularizations
In this paper, we propose a successive convex approximation framework for
sparse optimization where the nonsmooth regularization function in the
objective function is nonconvex and it can be written as the difference of two
convex functions. The proposed framework is based on a nontrivial combination
of the majorization-minimization framework and the successive convex
approximation framework proposed in literature for a convex regularization
function. The proposed framework has several attractive features, namely, i)
flexibility, as different choices of the approximate function lead to different
type of algorithms; ii) fast convergence, as the problem structure can be
better exploited by a proper choice of the approximate function and the
stepsize is calculated by the line search; iii) low complexity, as the
approximate function is convex and the line search scheme is carried out over a
differentiable function; iv) guaranteed convergence to a stationary point. We
demonstrate these features by two example applications in subspace learning,
namely, the network anomaly detection problem and the sparse subspace
clustering problem. Customizing the proposed framework by adopting the
best-response type approximation, we obtain soft-thresholding with exact line
search algorithms for which all elements of the unknown parameter are updated
in parallel according to closed-form expressions. The attractive features of
the proposed algorithms are illustrated numerically.Comment: submitted to IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Signal Processing,
special issue in Robust Subspace Learnin
Stochastic Training of Neural Networks via Successive Convex Approximations
This paper proposes a new family of algorithms for training neural networks
(NNs). These are based on recent developments in the field of non-convex
optimization, going under the general name of successive convex approximation
(SCA) techniques. The basic idea is to iteratively replace the original
(non-convex, highly dimensional) learning problem with a sequence of (strongly
convex) approximations, which are both accurate and simple to optimize.
Differently from similar ideas (e.g., quasi-Newton algorithms), the
approximations can be constructed using only first-order information of the
neural network function, in a stochastic fashion, while exploiting the overall
structure of the learning problem for a faster convergence. We discuss several
use cases, based on different choices for the loss function (e.g., squared loss
and cross-entropy loss), and for the regularization of the NN's weights. We
experiment on several medium-sized benchmark problems, and on a large-scale
dataset involving simulated physical data. The results show how the algorithm
outperforms state-of-the-art techniques, providing faster convergence to a
better minimum. Additionally, we show how the algorithm can be easily
parallelized over multiple computational units without hindering its
performance. In particular, each computational unit can optimize a tailored
surrogate function defined on a randomly assigned subset of the input
variables, whose dimension can be selected depending entirely on the available
computational power.Comment: Preprint submitted to IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and
Learning System
Generalized Separable Nonnegative Matrix Factorization
Nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) is a linear dimensionality technique
for nonnegative data with applications such as image analysis, text mining,
audio source separation and hyperspectral unmixing. Given a data matrix and
a factorization rank , NMF looks for a nonnegative matrix with
columns and a nonnegative matrix with rows such that .
NMF is NP-hard to solve in general. However, it can be computed efficiently
under the separability assumption which requires that the basis vectors appear
as data points, that is, that there exists an index set such that
. In this paper, we generalize the separability
assumption: We only require that for each rank-one factor for
, either for some or for
some . We refer to the corresponding problem as generalized separable NMF
(GS-NMF). We discuss some properties of GS-NMF and propose a convex
optimization model which we solve using a fast gradient method. We also propose
a heuristic algorithm inspired by the successive projection algorithm. To
verify the effectiveness of our methods, we compare them with several
state-of-the-art separable NMF algorithms on synthetic, document and image data
sets.Comment: 31 pages, 12 figures, 4 tables. We have added discussions about the
identifiability of the model, we have modified the first synthetic
experiment, we have clarified some aspects of the contributio
An Inexact Successive Quadratic Approximation Method for Convex L-1 Regularized Optimization
We study a Newton-like method for the minimization of an objective function
that is the sum of a smooth convex function and an l-1 regularization term.
This method, which is sometimes referred to in the literature as a proximal
Newton method, computes a step by minimizing a piecewise quadratic model of the
objective function. In order to make this approach efficient in practice, it is
imperative to perform this inner minimization inexactly. In this paper, we give
inexactness conditions that guarantee global convergence and that can be used
to control the local rate of convergence of the iteration. Our inexactness
conditions are based on a semi-smooth function that represents a (continuous)
measure of the optimality conditions of the problem, and that embodies the
soft-thresholding iteration. We give careful consideration to the algorithm
employed for the inner minimization, and report numerical results on two test
sets originating in machine learning
Inexact Block Coordinate Descent Algorithms for Nonsmooth Nonconvex Optimization
In this paper, we propose an inexact block coordinate descent algorithm for
large-scale nonsmooth nonconvex optimization problems. At each iteration, a
particular block variable is selected and updated by inexactly solving the
original optimization problem with respect to that block variable. More
precisely, a local approximation of the original optimization problem is
solved. The proposed algorithm has several attractive features, namely, i) high
flexibility, as the approximation function only needs to be strictly convex and
it does not have to be a global upper bound of the original function; ii) fast
convergence, as the approximation function can be designed to exploit the
problem structure at hand and the stepsize is calculated by the line search;
iii) low complexity, as the approximation subproblems are much easier to solve
and the line search scheme is carried out over a properly constructed
differentiable function; iv) guaranteed convergence of a subsequence to a
stationary point, even when the objective function does not have a Lipschitz
continuous gradient. Interestingly, when the approximation subproblem is solved
by a descent algorithm, convergence of a subsequence to a stationary point is
still guaranteed even if the approximation subproblem is solved inexactly by
terminating the descent algorithm after a finite number of iterations. These
features make the proposed algorithm suitable for large-scale problems where
the dimension exceeds the memory and/or the processing capability of the
existing hardware. These features are also illustrated by several applications
in signal processing and machine learning, for instance, network anomaly
detection and phase retrieval
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