EUROPT 2025
Abstract Submission

282. A unified Lyapunov analysis for first and second order methods attached to bilevel optimization

Invited abstract in session WC-2: Systematic and computer-aided analyses VI: Systematic approaches to the analyses of proximal and higher-order methods, stream Systematic and computer-aided analyses of optimization algorithms.

Wednesday, 14:00-16:00
Room: B100/7011

Authors (first author is the speaker)

1. David Alexander Hulett
Faculty of Mathematics, University of Vienna
2. Radu Ioan Bot
Faculty of Mathematics, University of Vienna
3. Enis Chenchene
4. Robert Csetnek
University of Vienna

Abstract

In a real Hilbert space, we address a convex bilevel optimization problem, where both the inner and outer levels have a composite smooth+nonsmooth structure. We study two algorithms, which at each step execute a proximal gradient step on a dynamically regularized objective function: one without momentum, in the spirit of the Bi-SG algorithm introduced by Merchav and Sabach in 2023, and one with momentum, in the spirit of the FBi-PG algorithm introduced by Merchav, Sabach and Teboulle in 2024. Attached to these algorithms we formulate a family of Lyapunov energy functionals which satisfy a certain descent property, and which allow us, in a streamlined way, to show convergence rates statements which match or surpass those already present in the literature. When the inner function satisfies a Hölderian error bound, we achieve small o rates for the inner and outer functional values along the last iterate, which is a first for this class of problems; additionally, the iterates converge weakly to a solution of the bilevel problem. These algorithms can be seen as forward discretizations of their continuous-time counterparts, which are respectively a first- and a second-order differential equation. The simpler, continuous-time Lyapunov analysis provides a guide and suggests the inequalities which should be reached in the discrete-time case.

Keywords

Status: accepted


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