A locally-built, LLM-digested index of recent arXiv papers in quant finance, geometry/topology, and statistical ML — keyword search served straight from SQLite on this machine.
This work proposes an unsupervised neural network framework for solving combinatorial optimization problems on graphs.
problem Challenges in neural networks solving combinatorial optimization problems without labeled instances.
method Inspired by Erdos' probabilistic method, a neural network parametrizes a probability distribution over sets, optimizing it to find low-cost integral solutions.
result The method provides valid solutions to the maximum clique problem and local graph clustering, achieving competitive results.
This paper focuses on Bayesian Optimization (BO) for objectives on combinatorial search spaces, including ordinal and categorical variables. Despite the abundance of potential applications of Combinatorial BO, including chipset configuration search and neural architecture search, only a handful of methods have been pro…
This paper presents a framework to tackle combinatorial optimization problems using neural networks and reinforcement learning. We focus on the traveling salesman problem (TSP) and train a recurrent network that, given a set of city coordinates, predicts a distribution over different city permutations. Using negative t…
We present a novel preconditioning technique for proximal optimization methods that relies on graph algorithms to construct effective preconditioners. Such combinatorial preconditioners arise from partitioning the graph into forests. We prove that certain decompositions lead to a theoretically optimal condition number.…
Let a A be the 1-skeleton of a triangulated topological annulus. We establish bounds on the combinatorial modulus of a refinement A′, formed by attaching new vertices and edges to A, that depend only on the refinement and not on the structure of A itself. This immediately applies to showing that a disk triangul…
Many real-world problems can be reduced to combinatorial optimization on a graph, where the subset or ordering of vertices that maximize some objective function must be found. With such tasks often NP-hard and analytically intractable, reinforcement learning (RL) has shown promise as a framework with which efficient he…
MIP-GNN uses graph neural networks to predict variable biases for MIP solvers.
problem Improving combinatorial optimization through data-driven insights.
method Encoding MILP interactions as graphs, training a graph neural network to predict variable biases, and guiding the MIP solver with these predictions.
result Significant improvements in solving binary MILPs compared to default settings of state-of-the-art solvers.
The paper finds minimum Steklov eigenvalues on combinatorial graphs.
problem Finding the minimum Steklov eigenvalues on combinatorial graphs.
method Extending Friedman's nodal domain theory for Laplacian eigenfunctions to Steklov eigenfunctions.
result The minimum of the imth Steklov eigenvalue on a connected combinatorial graph is essentially attained by a star or a regular comb with minimal brooms.
The design of good heuristics or approximation algorithms for NP-hard combinatorial optimization problems often requires significant specialized knowledge and trial-and-error. Can we automate this challenging, tedious process, and learn the algorithms instead? In many real-world applications, it is typically the case t…
Graph learning from data represents a canonical problem that has received substantial attention in the literature. However, insufficient work has been done in incorporating prior structural knowledge onto the learning of underlying graphical models from data. Learning a graph with a specific structure is essential for …
Combinatorial optimization problems are typically tackled by the branch-and-bound paradigm. We propose a new graph convolutional neural network model for learning branch-and-bound variable selection policies, which leverages the natural variable-constraint bipartite graph representation of mixed-integer linear programs…
We present a simple combinatorial model for quasipositive surfaces and positive braids, based on embedded bipartite graphs. As a first application, we extend the well-known duality on standard diagrams of torus links to twisted torus links. We then introduce a combinatorial notion of adjacency for bipartite graph links…
Combinatorial auctions are formulated as frustrated lattice gases on sparse random graphs, allowing the determination of the optimal revenue by methods of statistical physics. Transitions between computationally easy and hard regimes are found and interpreted in terms of the geometric structure of the space of solution…
BPNNs learn to solve combinatorial problems faster and more accurately.
problem Generalizing belief propagation for efficient problem solving.
method BPNNs are parameterized operators that operate on factor graphs, generalizing BP. BPNN-D is a learned iterative operator that provably maintains BP's properties.
result BPNN-D converges 1.7x faster on Ising models and provides tighter bounds.
In this work, we introduce Graph Pointer Networks (GPNs) trained using reinforcement learning (RL) for tackling the traveling salesman problem (TSP). GPNs build upon Pointer Networks by introducing a graph embedding layer on the input, which captures relationships between nodes. Furthermore, to approximate solutions to…
We propose a new family of combinatorial inference problems for graphical models. Unlike classical statistical inference where the main interest is point estimation or parameter testing, combinatorial inference aims at testing the global structure of the underlying graph. Examples include testing the graph connectivity…
We prove that the total curvature of any planar graph with nonnegative combinatorial curvature is an integral multiple of 121. As a corollary, this answers a question proposed by T. Réti.
Many problems in real life can be converted to combinatorial optimization problems (COPs) on graphs, that is to find a best node state configuration or a network structure such that the designed objective function is optimized under some constraints. However, these problems are notorious for their hardness to solve bec…