Descent heuristics for unconstrained minimization

Semidefinite relaxations often provide excellent starting points for nonconvex problems with multiple local minimizers. This work aims to find a local minimizer within a certain neighborhood of the starting point and with a small objective value. Several approaches are motivated and compared with each other. Citation Report, Mathematisches Institut, Universitaet Duesseldorf, August 2008. Article Download … Read more

Optimal steepest descent algorithms for unconstrained convex problems: fine tuning Nesterov’s method

We modify the first order algorithm for convex programming proposed by Nesterov. The resulting algorithm keeps the optimal complexity obtained by Nesterov with no need of a known Lipschitz constant for the gradient, and performs better in practically all examples in a set of test problems. Citation Technical Report, Federal University of Santa Catarina, 2008. … Read more

A stochastic algorithm for function minimization

Focusing on what an optimization problem may comply with, the so-called convergence conditions have been proposed and sequentially a stochastic optimization algorithm named as DSZ algorithm is presented in order to deal with both unconstrained and constrained optimizations. Its principle is discussed in the theoretical model of DSZ algorithm, from which we present a practical … Read more

ORBIT: Optimization by Radial Basis Function Interpolation in Trust-Regions

We present a new derivative-free algorithm, ORBIT, for unconstrained local optimization of computationally expensive functions. A trust-region framework using interpolating Radial Basis Function (RBF) models is employed. The RBF models considered often allow ORBIT to interpolate nonlinear functions using fewer function evaluations than the polynomial models considered by present techniques. Approximation guarantees are obtained by … Read more

Extended Barzilai-Borwein method for unconstrained minimization problems

In 1988, Barzilai and Borwein presented a new choice of step size for the gradient method for solving unconstrained minimization problems. Their method aimed to accelerate the convergence of the steepest descent method. The Barzilai-Borwein method requires few storage locations and inexpensive computations. Therefore, several authors have paid attention to the Barzilai-Borwein method and have … Read more

Accelerated line-search and trust-region methods

In numerical optimization, line-search and trust-region methods are two important classes of descent schemes, with well-understood global convergence properties. Here we consider “accelerated” versions of these methods, where the conventional iterate is allowed to be replaced by any point that produces at least as much decrease in the cost function as a fixed fraction of … Read more

A subspace minimization method for the trust-region step

We consider methods for large-scale unconstrained minimization based on finding an approximate minimizer of a quadratic function subject to a two-norm trust-region constraint. The Steihaug-Toint method uses the conjugate-gradient (CG) algorithm to minimize the quadratic over a sequence of expanding subspaces until the iterates either converge to an interior point or cross the constraint boundary. … Read more

Benchmarking Derivative-Free Optimization Algorithms

We propose data profiles as a tool for analyzing the performance of derivative-free optimization solvers when there are constraints on the computational budget. We use performance and data profiles, together with a convergence test that measures the decrease in function value, to analyze the performance of three solvers on sets of smooth, noisy, and piecewise-smooth … Read more

Primal interior point method for minimization of generalized minimax functions

In this report, we propose a primal interior-point method for large sparse generalized minimax optimization. After a short introduction, where the problem is stated, we introduce the basic equations of the Newton method applied to the KKT conditions and propose a primal interior-point method. Next we describe the basic algorithm and give more details concerning … Read more

Iterative methods for finding a trust-region step

We consider the problem of finding an approximate minimizer of a general quadratic function subject to a two-norm constraint. The Steihaug-Toint method minimizes the quadratic over a sequence of expanding subspaces until the iterates either converge to an interior point or cross the constraint boundary. The benefit of this approach is that an approximate solution … Read more