30 research outputs found
Private Learning Implies Online Learning: An Efficient Reduction
We study the relationship between the notions of differentially private
learning and online learning in games. Several recent works have shown that
differentially private learning implies online learning, but an open problem of
Neel, Roth, and Wu \cite{NeelAaronRoth2018} asks whether this implication is
{\it efficient}. Specifically, does an efficient differentially private learner
imply an efficient online learner? In this paper we resolve this open question
in the context of pure differential privacy. We derive an efficient black-box
reduction from differentially private learning to online learning from expert
advice
Boosting Simple Learners
Boosting is a celebrated machine learning approach which is based on the idea
of combining weak and moderately inaccurate hypotheses to a strong and accurate
one. We study boosting under the assumption that the weak hypotheses belong to
a class of bounded capacity. This assumption is inspired by the common
convention that weak hypotheses are "rules-of-thumbs" from an "easy-to-learn
class". (Schapire and Freund '12, Shalev-Shwartz and Ben-David '14.) Formally,
we assume the class of weak hypotheses has a bounded VC dimension. We focus on
two main questions: (i) Oracle Complexity: How many weak hypotheses are needed
in order to produce an accurate hypothesis? We design a novel boosting
algorithm and demonstrate that it circumvents a classical lower bound by Freund
and Schapire ('95, '12). Whereas the lower bound shows that
weak hypotheses with -margin are sometimes
necessary, our new method requires only weak
hypothesis, provided that they belong to a class of bounded VC dimension.
Unlike previous boosting algorithms which aggregate the weak hypotheses by
majority votes, the new boosting algorithm uses more complex ("deeper")
aggregation rules. We complement this result by showing that complex
aggregation rules are in fact necessary to circumvent the aforementioned lower
bound. (ii) Expressivity: Which tasks can be learned by boosting weak
hypotheses from a bounded VC class? Can complex concepts that are "far away"
from the class be learned? Towards answering the first question we identify a
combinatorial-geometric parameter which captures the expressivity of
base-classes in boosting. As a corollary we provide an affirmative answer to
the second question for many well-studied classes, including half-spaces and
decision stumps. Along the way, we establish and exploit connections with
Discrepancy Theory.Comment: A minor revision according to STOC review
Online Admission Control and Embedding of Service Chains
The virtualization and softwarization of modern computer networks enables the
definition and fast deployment of novel network services called service chains:
sequences of virtualized network functions (e.g., firewalls, caches, traffic
optimizers) through which traffic is routed between source and destination.
This paper attends to the problem of admitting and embedding a maximum number
of service chains, i.e., a maximum number of source-destination pairs which are
routed via a sequence of to-be-allocated, capacitated network functions. We
consider an Online variant of this maximum Service Chain Embedding Problem,
short OSCEP, where requests arrive over time, in a worst-case manner. Our main
contribution is a deterministic O(log L)-competitive online algorithm, under
the assumption that capacities are at least logarithmic in L. We show that this
is asymptotically optimal within the class of deterministic and randomized
online algorithms. We also explore lower bounds for offline approximation
algorithms, and prove that the offline problem is APX-hard for unit capacities
and small L > 2, and even Poly-APX-hard in general, when there is no bound on
L. These approximation lower bounds may be of independent interest, as they
also extend to other problems such as Virtual Circuit Routing. Finally, we
present an exact algorithm based on 0-1 programming, implying that the general
offline SCEP is in NP and by the above hardness results it is NP-complete for
constant L.Comment: early version of SIROCCO 2015 pape
O letramento e o ensino de literatura mediados por jogos digitais educacionais
A partir da dificuldade nacompreensão de textos literáriosque alunos do ensino médio apresentam, geralmente associada a pouca valoração da leitura, desenvolveu-se uma pesquisa que explora o jogo digital como motivador do interesse pela leitura de obras pertencentes ao sistema literário brasileiro, bem como no desenvolvimento do letramento deste aluno. A pesquisa apresenta resultados ainda preliminares e dá-se por meio de revisão bibliográfica, análises quanti/qualitativas, a formação de grupos de estudo com alunos de nível médio em instituições de ensino técnico e tecnológico e a criação de um fórum de discussão disponibilizado em uma importante rede social. O emprego do jogo a ser desenvolvido apoia-se nos conceitos de aprendizagem significativa, em estudos sobre a formação social da mente, bem como no conceito de zona de desenvolvimento proximal. Os sistemas de regras, a jogabilidade e a dimensão estética do jogo serão os diferenciais abordados como elementos motivacionais do aluno/leitor.XI Workshop tecnología informática aplicada en educaciónRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI
On the Complexity of Newman's Community Finding Approach for Biological and Social Networks
Given a graph of interactions, a module (also called a community or cluster)
is a subset of nodes whose fitness is a function of the statistical
significance of the pairwise interactions of nodes in the module. The topic of
this paper is a model-based community finding approach, commonly referred to as
modularity clustering, that was originally proposed by Newman and has
subsequently been extremely popular in practice. Various heuristic methods are
currently employed for finding the optimal solution. However, the exact
computational complexity of this approach is still largely unknown.
To this end, we initiate a systematic study of the computational complexity
of modularity clustering. Due to the specific quadratic nature of the
modularity function, it is necessary to study its value on sparse graphs and
dense graphs separately. Our main results include a (1+\eps)-inapproximability
for dense graphs and a logarithmic approximation for sparse graphs. We make use
of several combinatorial properties of modularity to get these results. These
are the first non-trivial approximability results beyond the previously known
NP-hardness results.Comment: Journal of Computer and System Sciences, 201
On k-Column Sparse Packing Programs
We consider the class of packing integer programs (PIPs) that are column
sparse, i.e. there is a specified upper bound k on the number of constraints
that each variable appears in. We give an (ek+o(k))-approximation algorithm for
k-column sparse PIPs, improving on recent results of and
. We also show that the integrality gap of our linear programming
relaxation is at least 2k-1; it is known that k-column sparse PIPs are
-hard to approximate. We also extend our result (at the loss
of a small constant factor) to the more general case of maximizing a submodular
objective over k-column sparse packing constraints.Comment: 19 pages, v3: additional detail
The role of anion gap normalization time in the management of pediatric diabetic ketoacidosis
IntroductionOur aims were to determine whether anion gap normalization time (AGNT) correlates with risk factors related to the severity of diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) in children, and to characterize AGNT as a criterion for DKA resolution in children admitted with moderate or severe disease.MethodsA ten-year retrospective cohort study of children admitted to the intensive care unit with DKA. We used a survival analysis approach to determine changes in serum glucose, bicarbonate, pH, and anion gap following admission. Using multivariate analysis, we examined associations between patients' demographic and laboratory characteristics with delayed normalization of the anion gap.ResultsA total of 95 patients were analyzed. The median AGNT was 8 h. Delayed AGNT (>8 h) correlated with pH < 7.1 and serum glucose >500 mg/dL. In multivariate analysis, glucose >500 mg/dL was associated with an increased risk for delayed AGNT, by 3.41 fold. Each 25 mg/dL elevation in glucose was associated with a 10% increment in risk for delayed AGNT. Median AGNT preceded median PICU discharge by 15 h (8 vs. 23 h).DiscussionAGNT represents a return to normal glucose-based physiology and an improvement in dehydration. The correlation observed between delayed AGNT and markers of DKA severity supports the usefulness of AGNT for assessing DKA recovery
On Approximating Four Covering and Packing Problems
In this paper, we consider approximability issues of the following four
problems: triangle packing, full sibling reconstruction, maximum profit
coverage and 2-coverage. All of them are generalized or specialized versions of
set-cover and have applications in biology ranging from full-sibling
reconstructions in wild populations to biomolecular clusterings; however, as
this paper shows, their approximability properties differ considerably. Our
inapproximability constant for the triangle packing problem improves upon the
previous results; this is done by directly transforming the inapproximability
gap of Haastad for the problem of maximizing the number of satisfied equations
for a set of equations over GF(2) and is interesting in its own right. Our
approximability results on the full siblings reconstruction problems answers
questions originally posed by Berger-Wolf et al. and our results on the maximum
profit coverage problem provides almost matching upper and lower bounds on the
approximation ratio, answering a question posed by Hassin and Or.Comment: 25 page