Nonlinear Analysis and Optimization with Applications

Nonlinear analysis has wide and significant applications in many areas of mathematics, including functional analysis, variational analysis, nonlinear optimization, convex analysis, nonlinear ordinary and partial differential equations, dynamical system theory, mathematical economics, game theory, signal processing, control theory, data mining, and so forth. Optimization problems have been intensively investigated, and various feasible methods in analyzing convergence of algorithms have been developed over the last half century. In this Special Issue, we will focus on the connection between nonlinear analysis and optimization as well as their applications to integrate basic science into the real world

Cluster Variation Method in Statistical Physics and Probabilistic Graphical Models

The cluster variation method (CVM) is a hierarchy of approximate variational techniques for discrete (Ising--like) models in equilibrium statistical mechanics, improving on the mean--field approximation and the Bethe--Peierls approximation, which can be regarded as the lowest level of the CVM. In recent years it has been applied both in statistical physics and to inference and optimization problems formulated in terms of probabilistic graphical models. The foundations of the CVM are briefly reviewed, and the relations with similar techniques are discussed. The main properties of the method are considered, with emphasis on its exactness for particular models and on its asymptotic properties. The problem of the minimization of the variational free energy, which arises in the CVM, is also addressed, and recent results about both provably convergent and message-passing algorithms are discussed.Comment: 36 pages, 17 figure