We present a practical algorithm for computing the minimum volume n-dimensional ellipsoid that must contain m given points a_1, …, a_m \in R^n. This convex constrained problem arises in a variety of applied computational settings, particularly in data mining and robust statistics. Its structure makes it particularly amenable to solution by interior-point methods, and it … Read more
In recent years, several condition numbers were defined for a variety of linear programming problems based upon relative distances to ill-posedness. In this paper we provide a unifying view of these condition numbers. To do so, we introduce yet another linear programming problem and show that its distance to ill-posedness naturally captures the most commonly … Read more
High Dimension Low Sample Size statistical analysis is becoming increasingly important in a wide range of applied contexts. In such situations, it is seen that the popular Support Vector Machine suffers from “data piling” at the margin, which can diminish generalizability. This leads naturally to the development of Distance Weighted Discrimination, which is based on … Read more
This paper considers the following inverse optimization problem: given a linear program, a desired optimal objective value, and a set of feasible cost coefficients, determine a cost-coefficient vector such that the corresponding optimal objective value of the linear program is closest to the given value. The above problem, referred here as the inverse optimal value … Read more
Hierarchies of semidefinite relaxations for $0/1$ polytopes have been constructed by Lasserre (2001a) and by Lov\’asz and Schrijver (1991), permitting to find the cut polytope of a graph on $n$ nodes in $n$ steps. We show that $\left\lceil {n\over 2} \right\rceil$ iterations are needed for finding the cut polytope of the complete graph $K_n$. Citation … Read more
Current mixed-integer linear programming solvers are based on linear programming routines that use floating point arithmetic. Occasionally, this leads to wrong solutions, even for problems where all coefficients and all solution components are small integers. It is shown how, using directed rounding and interval arithmetic, cheap pre- and postprocessing of the linear programs arising in … Read more
The satisfiability (SAT) problem is a central problem in mathematical logic, computing theory, and artificial intelligence. An instance of SAT is specified by a set of boolean variables and a propositional formula in conjunctive normal form. Given such an instance, the SAT problem asks whether there is a truth assignment to the variables such that … Read more
It was recently shown that, unlike in linear optimization, the central path in semidefinite optimization (SDO) does not converge to the analytic center of the optimal set in general. In this paper we analyze the limiting behavior of the central path to explain this unexpected phenomenon. This is done by deriving a new necessary and … Read more
We study homogeneous convex cones. We first characterize the extreme rays of such cones in the context of their primal construction (due to Vinberg) and also in the context of their dual construction (due to Rothaus). Then, using these results, we prove that every homogeneous cone is facially exposed. We provide an alternative proof of … Read more
In linear programming, the central path is known to converge to the analytic center of the set of optimal solutions. Recently, it has been shown that this is not necessarily true for linear semidefinite programming in the absence of strict complementarity. The present paper deals with the formulation of a convex problem whose solution defines … Read more