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We consider image deblurring problem in the presence of impulsive noise. It is known that \emph{total variation} (TV) regularization with L1-norm penalized data fitting (TVL1 for short) works reasonably well only when the level of impulsive noise is relatively low. For high level impulsive noise, TVL1 works poorly. The reason is that all data, both corrupted and noise free, are equally penalized in data fitting, leading to insurmountable difficulty in balancing regularization and data fitting. In this paper, we propose to combine TV regularization with nonconvex \emph{smoothly clipped absolute deviation} (SCAD) penalty for data fitting (TVSCAD for short). Our motivation is simply that data fitting should be enforced only when an observed data is not severely corrupted, while for those data more likely to be severely corrupted, less or even null penalization should be enforced. A \emph{difference of convex functions} algorithm is adopted to solve the nonconvex TVSCAD model, resulting in solving a sequence of TVL1-equivalent problems, each of which can then be solved efficiently by the alternating direction method of multipliers. Theoretically, we establish global convergence to a critical point of the nonconvex objective function. The R-linear and at-least-sublinear convergence rate results are derived for the cases of anisotropic and isotropic TV, respectively. Numerically, experimental results are given to show that the TVSCAD approach improves those of the TVL1 significantly, especially for cases with high level impulsive noise, and is comparable with the recently proposed iteratively corrected TVL1 method [\textit{Inverse Problems}, 32 (2016), pp.~085004].

Frequentists' inference often delivers point estimators associated with condence intervals or sets for parameters of interest. Constructing the condence intervals or sets requires understanding the sampling distributions of the point estimators, which, in many but not all cases, are related to asymptotic Normal distributions ensured by central limit theorems. Although previous literature has established various forms of central limit theorems for statistical inference in super population models, we still need general and convenient forms of central limit theorems for some randomization-based causal analysis of experimental data, where the parameters of interests are functions of a nite population and randomness comes solely from the treatment assignment. We use central limit theorems for sample surveys and rank statistics to establish general forms of the nite population central limit theorems that are particularly useful for proving asymptotic distributions of randomization tests under the sharp null hypothesis of zero individual causal eects, and for obtaining the asymptotic repeated sampling distributions of the causal eect estimators. The new central limit theorems hold for general experimental designs with multiple treatment levels, multiple treatment factors and vector outcomes, and are immediately applicable for studying the asymptotic properties of many methods in causal inference, including instrumental variable, regression adjustment, rerandomization, clustered randomized experiments, and so on. Previously, the asymptotic properties of these problems are often based on heuristic arguments, which in fact rely on general forms of nite population central limit theorems that have not been established before. Our new theorems ll in this gap by providing more solid theoretical foundation for asymptotic randomization-based causal inference.

We consider the problem of minimizing the sum of a smooth function h with a bounded Hessian and a nonsmooth function. We assume that the latter function is a composition of a proper closed function P and a surjective linear map M. This problem is nonconvex in general and encompasses many important applications in engineering and machine learning. In this paper, we examined two types of splitting methods for solving this nonconvex optimization problem: the alternating direction method of multipliers and the proximal gradient algorithm. For the direct adaptation of the alternating direction method of multipliers, we show that if the penalty parameter is chosen sufficiently large and the sequence generated has a cluster point, then it gives a stationary point of the nonconvex problem. We also establish convergence of the whole sequence under an additional assumption that the functions h and P are semialgebraic. Furthermore, we give simple sufficient conditions to guarantee boundedness of the sequence generated. These conditions can be satisfied for a wide range of applications including the least squares problem with the 1/2 regularization. Finally, when M is the identity so that the proximal gradient algorithm can be efficiently applied, we show that any cluster point is stationary under a slightly more flexible constant step-size rule than what is known in the literature for a nonconvex h. We illustrate our theoretical finding with a variety of applications such as signal denoising and sparse optimisation problems.

We adapt the Douglas–Rachford (DR) splitting method to solve nonconvex feasibility problems by studying this method for a class of nonconvex optimization problem. While the convergence properties of the method for convex problems have been well studied, far less is known in the nonconvex setting. In this paper, for the direct adaptation of the method to minimize the sum of a proper closed function g and a smooth function f with a Lipschitz continuous gradient, we show that if the step-size parameter is smaller than a computable threshold and the sequence generated has a cluster point, then it gives a stationary point of the optimization problem. Convergence of the whole sequence and a local convergence rate are also established under the additional assumption that f and g are semi-algebraic. We also give simple sufficient conditions guaranteeing the boundedness of the sequence generated. We then apply our nonconvex DR splitting method to finding a point in the intersection of a closed convex set C and a general closed set D by minimizing the squared distance to C subject to D. We show that if either set is bounded and the step-size parameter is smaller than a computable threshold, then the sequence generated from the DR splitting method is actually bounded. Consequently, the sequence generated will have cluster points that are stationary for an optimization problem, and the whole sequence is convergent under an additional assumption that C and D are semi-algebraic. We achieve these results based on a new merit function constructed particularly for the DR splitting method. Our numerical results indicate that our DR splitting method usually outperforms the usual DR splitting method and the alternating projection method in finding a sparse solution of a linear system, in terms of both the solution quality and the number of iterations taken.

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We develop a generic game platform that can be used to model various real-world systems with multiple intelligent cloud-computing pools and parallel-queues for resources-competing users. Inside the platform, the software structure is modelled as Blockchain. All the users are associated with Big Data arrival streams whose random dynamics is modelled by triply stochastic renewal reward processes (TSRRPs). Each user may be served simultaneously by multiple pools while each pool with parallel- servers may also serve multi-users at the same time via smart policies in the Blockchain, e.g. a Nash equilibrium point myopically at each fixed time to a game-theoretic scheduling problem. To illustrate the effectiveness of our game platform, we model the performance measures of its internal data flow dynamics (queue length and workload processes) as reflecting diffusion with regime-switchings (RDRSs) under our scheduling policies. By RDRS models, we can prove our myopic game-theoretic policy to be an asymptotic Pareto minimal-dual-cost Nash equilibrium one globally over the whole time horizon to a randomly evolving dynamic game problem. Iterative schemes for simulating our multi-dimensional RDRS models are also developed with the support of numerical comparisons.

The nuclear norm is widely used to induce low-rank solutions for many optimization problems with matrix variables. Recently, it has been shown that the augmented Lagrangian method (ALM) and the alternating direction method (ADM) are very efficient for many convex programming problems arising from various applications, provided that the resulting subproblems are sufficiently simple to have closed-form solutions. In this paper, we are interested in the application of the ALM and the ADM for some nuclear norm involved minimization problems. When the resulting subproblems do not have closed-form solutions, we propose to linearize these subproblems such that closed-form solutions of these linearized subproblems can be easily derived. Global convergence results of these linearized ALM and ADM are established under standard assumptions. Finally, we verify the effectiveness and efficiency of these new methods by some numerical experiments.

This paper focuses on coordinate update methods, which are useful for solving problems involving large or high-dimensional datasets. They decompose a problem into simple subproblems, where each updates one, or a small block of, variables while fixing others. These methods can deal with linear and nonlinear mappings, smooth and nonsmooth functions, as well as convex and nonconvex problems. In addition, they are easy to parallelize. The great performance of coordinate update methods depends on solving simple sub-problems. To derive simple subproblems for several new classes of applications, this paper systematically studies coordinate-friendly operators that perform low-cost coordinate updates. Based on the discovered coordinate friendly operators, as well as operator splitting techniques, we obtain new coordinate update algorithms for a variety of problems in machine learning, image processing, as well as sub-areas of optimization. Several problems are treated with coordinate update for the first time in history. The obtained algorithms are scalable to large instances through parallel and even asynchronous computing. We present numerical examples to illustrate how effective these algorithms are.

The alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) is a popular and efficient first-order method that has recently found numerous applications, and the proximal ADMM is an important variant of it. The main contributions of this paper are the proposition and the analysis of a class of inertial proximal ADMMs, which unify the basic ideas of the inertial proximal point method and the proximal ADMM, for linearly constrained separable convex optimization. This class of methods are of inertial nature because at each iteration the proximal ADMM is applied to a point extrapolated at the current iterate in the direction of last movement. The recently proposed inertial primal-dual algorithm [A. Chambolle and T. Pock, On the ergodic convergence rates of a first-order primaldual algorithm, preprint, 2014, Algorithm 3] and the inertial linearized ADMM [C. Chen, S. Ma, and J. Yang, arXiv:1407.8238, eq. (3.23)] are covered as special cases. The proposed algorithmic framework is very general in the sense that the weighting matrices in the proximal terms are allowed to be only positive semidefinite, but not necessarily positive definite as required by existing methods of the same kind. By setting the two proximal terms to zero, we obtain an inertial variant of the classical ADMM, which is to the best of our knowledge new. We carry out a unified analysis for the entire class of methods under very mild assumptions. In particular, convergence, as well as asymptotic $o(1/\sqrt{k})$ and nonasymptotic $O(1/\sqrt{k})$ rates of convergence, are established for the best primal function value and feasibility residues, where k denotes the iteration counter. The global iterate convergence of the generated sequence is established under an additional assumption. We also present extensive experimental results on total variation–based image reconstruction problems to illustrate the profits gained by introducing the inertial extrapolation steps.

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No abstract uploaded!

This paper studies the capacity allocation game between duopolistic airlines which could offer callable products. Previous literature has shown that callable products provide a riskless source of additional rev- enue for a monopolistic airline. We examine the impact of the introduction of callable products on the revenues and the booking limits of duopolistic airlines. The analytical results demonstrate that, when there is no spill of low-fare customers, offering callable products is a dominant strategy of both airlines and provides Pareto gains to both airlines. When customers of both fare classes spill, offering callable products is no longer a dominant strategy and may harm the revenues of the airlines. Numerical ex- amples demonstrate that whether the two airlines offer callable products and whether offering callable products is beneficial to the two airlines mainly depends on their loads and capacities. Specifically, when the difference between the loads of the airlines is large, the loads of the airlines play the most important role. When the difference between the loads of the airlines is small, the capacities of the airlines play the most important role. Moreover, numerical examples show that the booking limits of the two airlines in the case with callable products are always higher than those in the case without callable products.

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This paper is a follow-up of the work [Chen, J.-S.: J. Optimiz. Theory Appl., Submitted for publication (2004)] where an NCP-function and a descent method were proposed for the nonlinear complementarity problem. An unconstrained reformulation was formulated due to a merit function based on the proposed NCP-function. We continue to explore properties of the merit function in this paper. In particular, we show that the gradient of the merit function is globally Lipschitz continuous which is important from computational aspect. Moreover, we show that the merit function is <i>SC</i> ¹ function which means it is continuously differentiable and its gradient is semismooth. On the other hand, we provide an alternative proof, which uses the new properties of the merit function, for the convergence result of the descent method considered in [Chen, J.-S.: J. Optimiz. Theory Appl., Submitted for publication (2004)].

The surveys in the field of nonlinear filtering (NLF) are enumerous. Most of them are application-oriented and served as the tutorials for the practioners. The local approaches, including Kalman filter and its invariants, have already been studied from various point of views, due to its off-the-shelf implementation and wide applications. However, it cannot give good estimation of the states in highly nonlinear system or with non-Gaussian initial conditional density functions. Moreover, while the local methods only approximate the mean and variance, the global ones seek the way to directly obtain the conditional density function of the states. Consequently, all the statistical information is acquired. In this survey, we shall briefly go through the local approaches and put emphases on the existing three major global approaches: finite-dimensional NLF, sequential Monte Carlo methods (particle filter) and the {Yau-Yau's} on- and off-line solver of Duncan-Mortensen-Zakai's equation {\cite{YY_08}}. The discussions are mainly from the mathematical point of view.

We study the averaging of fronts moving with positive oscillatory normal velocity, which is periodic in space and stationary ergodic in time. The problem can be formulated as the homogenization of coercive level set Hamilton-Jacobi equations with spatio-temporal oscillations. To overcome the difficulties due to the oscillations in time and the linear growth of the Hamiltonian, we first study the long time averaged behavior of the associated reachable sets using geometric arguments. The results are new for higher than one dimensions even in the space-time periodic setting.

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The total variation (TV) model is attractive in that it is able to preserve sharp attributes in images. However, the restored images from TV-based methods do not usually stay in a given dynamic range, and hence projection is required to bring them back into the dynamic range for visual presentation or for storage in digital media. This will affect the accuracy of the restoration as the projected image will no longer be the minimizer of the given TV model. In this paper, we show that one can get much more accurate solutions by imposing box constraints on the TV models and solving the resulting constrained models. Our numerical results show that for some images where there are many pixels with values lying on the boundary of the dynamic range, the gain can be as great as 10.28 decibel in the peak signal-to-noise ratio. One traditional hindrance using the constrained model is that it is difficult to solve. However, in this paper, we propose using the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) to solve the constrained models. This leads to a fast and convergent algorithm that is applicable for both Gaussian and impulse noise. Numerical results show that our ADMM algorithm is better than some state-of-the-art algorithms for unconstrained models in terms of both accuracy and robustness with respect to the regularization parameter.

In this paper, we study, for the first time, nonconvex minimax separable quadratic optimization problems with multiple separable quadratic constraints and their second-order cone programming (SOCP) relaxations. Under suitable conditions, we establish exact SOCP relaxation for minimax nonconvex separable quadratic programs. We show that various important classes of specially structured minimax quadratic optimization problems admit exact SOCP relaxations under easily verifiable conditions. These classes include some minimax extended trust-region problems, minimax uniform quadratic optimization problems, max dispersion problems, and some robust quadratic optimization problems under bounded data uncertainty. The present work shows that nonconvex minimax separable quadratic problems with quadratic constraints, which contain a hidden closed and convex epigraphical set, exhibit exact SOCP relaxations.

This paper focuses on pricing and vertical cooperative advertising decisions in a two-tier supply chain. Using a Stackelberg game model where the manufacturer acts as the game leader and the retailer acts as the game follower, we obtain closed-form equilibrium solution and explicitly show how pricing and advertising decisions are made. When market demand decreases exponentially with respect to the retail price and increases with respect to national and local advertising expenditures in an additive way, the manufacturer benefits from providing percentage reimbursement for the retailer’s local advertising expenditure when demand price elasticity is large enough. Whether the manufacturer benefits from cooperative advertising is also closely related to supply chain member’s relative advertising efficiency. In the decision for adopting coop advertising strategy, it is critical for the manufacturer to identify how market demand depends on national and local advertisements. The findings from this research can enhance our understanding of cooperative advertising decisions in a two-tier supply chain with price-dependent demand.

In this article, we propose two numerical methods, the Gaussian Process (GP) method and the Fourier Features (FF) algorithm, to solve mean field games (MFGs). The GP algorithm approximates the solution of a MFG with maximum a posteriori probability estimators of GPs conditioned on the partial differential equation (PDE) system of the MFG at a finite number of sample points. The main bottleneck of the GP method is to compute the inverse of a square gram matrix, whose size is proportional to the number of sample points. To improve the performance, we introduce the FF method, whose insight comes from the recent trend of approximating positive definite kernels with random Fourier features. The FF algorithm seeks approximated solutions in the space generated by sampled Fourier features. In the FF method, the size of the matrix to be inverted depends only on the number of Fourier features selected, which is much less than the size of sample points. Hence, the FF method reduces the precomputation time, saves the memory, and achieves comparable accuracy to the GP method. We give the existence and the convergence proofs for both algorithms. The convergence argument of the GP method does not depend on any monotonicity condition, which suggests the potential applications of the GP method to solve MFGs with non-monotone couplings in future work. We show the efficacy of our algorithms through experiments on a stationary MFG with a non-local coupling and on a time-dependent planning problem. We believe that the FF method can also serve as an alternative algorithm to solve general PDEs.

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