This work studies the global convergence and implicit bias of Gauss Newton's (GN) when optimizing over-parameterized one-hidden layer networks in the mean-field regime. We first establish a global convergence result for GN in the continuous-time limit exhibiting a faster convergence rate compared to GD due to improved conditioning. We then perform an empirical study on a synthetic regression task to investigate the implicit bias of GN's method. While GN is consistently faster than GD in finding a global optimum, the learned model generalizes well on test data when starting from random initial weights with a small variance and using a small step size to slow down convergence. Specifically, our study shows that such a setting results in a hidden learning phenomenon, where the dynamics are able to recover features with good generalization properties despite the model having sub-optimal training and test performances due to an under-optimized linear layer. This study exhibits a trade-off between the convergence speed of GN and the generalization ability of the learned solution.
Large Language Models (LLMs) and, more specifically, the Generative Pre-Trained Transformers (GPT) can help stakeholders in climate action explore digital knowledge bases and extract and utilize climate action knowledge in a sustainable manner. However, LLMs are "probabilistic models of knowledge bases" that excel at generating convincing texts but cannot be entirely relied upon due to the probabilistic nature of the information produced. This brief report illustrates the problem space with examples of LLM responses to some of the questions of relevance to climate action.
This work has been motivated by a longitudinal data set on HIV CD4 T+ cell counts from Livingstone district, Zambia. The corresponding histogram plots indicate lack of symmetry in the marginal distributions and the pairwise scatter plots show non-elliptical dependence patterns. The standard linear mixed model for longitudinal data fails to capture these features. Thus it seems appropriate to consider a more general framework for modeling such data. In this article, we consider generalized linear mixed models (GLMM) for the marginals (e.g. Gamma mixed model), and temporal dependency of the repeated measurements is modeled by the copula corresponding to some skew-elliptical distributions (like skew-normal/skew-t). Our proposed class of copula based mixed models simultaneously takes into account asymmetry, between-subject variability and non-standard temporal dependence, and hence can be considered extensions to the standard linear mixed model based on multivariate normality. We estimate the model parameters using the IFM (inference function of margins) method, and also describe how to obtain standard errors of the parameter estimates. We investigate the finite sample performance of our procedure with extensive simulation studies involving skewed and symmetric marginal distributions and several choices of the copula. We finally apply our models to the HIV data set and report the findings.
In recent years, deep learning has gained increasing popularity in the fields of Partial Differential Equations (PDEs) and Reduced Order Modeling (ROM), providing domain practitioners with new powerful data-driven techniques such as Physics-Informed Neural Networks (PINNs), Neural Operators, Deep Operator Networks (DeepONets) and Deep-Learning based ROMs (DL-ROMs). In this context, deep autoencoders based on Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) have proven extremely effective, outperforming established techniques, such as the reduced basis method, when dealing with complex nonlinear problems. However, despite the empirical success of CNN-based autoencoders, there are only a few theoretical results supporting these architectures, usually stated in the form of universal approximation theorems. In particular, although the existing literature provides users with guidelines for designing convolutional autoencoders, the subsequent challenge of learning the latent features has been barely investigated. Furthermore, many practical questions remain unanswered, e.g., the number of snapshots needed for convergence or the neural network training strategy. In this work, using recent techniques from sparse high-dimensional function approximation, we fill some of these gaps by providing a new practical existence theorem for CNN-based autoencoders when the parameter-to-solution map is holomorphic. This regularity assumption arises in many relevant classes of parametric PDEs, such as the parametric diffusion equation, for which we discuss an explicit application of our general theory.
Random probabilities are a key component to many nonparametric methods in Statistics and Machine Learning. To quantify comparisons between different laws of random probabilities several works are starting to use the elegant Wasserstein over Wasserstein distance. In this paper we prove that the infinite-dimensionality of the space of probabilities drastically deteriorates its sample complexity, which is slower than any polynomial rate in the sample size. We thus propose a new distance that preserves many desirable properties of the former while achieving a parametric rate of convergence. In particular, our distance 1) metrizes weak convergence; 2) can be estimated numerically through samples with low complexity; 3) can be bounded analytically from above and below. The main ingredient are integral probability metrics, which lead to the name hierarchical IPM.
Fully Bayesian methods for Cox models specify a model for the baseline hazard function. Parametric approaches generally provide monotone estimations. Semi-parametric choices allow for more flexible patterns but they can suffer from overfitting and instability. Regularization methods through prior distributions with correlated structures usually give reasonable answers to these types of situations. We discuss Bayesian regularization for Cox survival models defined via flexible baseline hazards specified by a mixture of piecewise constant functions and by a cubic B-spline function. For those "semiparametric" proposals, different prior scenarios ranging from prior independence to particular correlated structures are discussed in a real study with micro-virulence data and in an extensive simulation scenario that includes different data sample and time axis partition sizes in order to capture risk variations. The posterior distribution of the parameters was approximated using Markov chain Monte Carlo methods. Model selection was performed in accordance with the Deviance Information Criteria and the Log Pseudo-Marginal Likelihood. The results obtained reveal that, in general, Cox models present great robustness in covariate effects and survival estimates independent of the baseline hazard specification. In relation to the "semi-parametric" baseline hazard specification, the B-splines hazard function is less dependent on the regularization process than the piecewise specification because it demands a smaller time axis partition to estimate a similar behaviour of the risk.
In recent years, many positivity-preserving schemes for initial value problems have been constructed by modifying a Runge--Kutta (RK) method by weighting the right-hand side of the system of differential equations with solution-dependent factors. These include the classes of modified Patankar--Runge--Kutta (MPRK) and Geometric Conservative (GeCo) methods. Compared to traditional RK methods, the analysis of accuracy and stability of these methods is more complicated. In this work, we provide a comprehensive and unifying theory of order conditions for such RK-like methods, which differ from original RK schemes in that their coefficients are solution-dependent. The resulting order conditions are themselves solution-dependent and obtained using the theory of NB-series, and thus, can easily be read off from labeled N-trees. We present for the first time order conditions for MPRK and GeCo schemes of arbitrary order; For MPRK schemes, the order conditions are given implicitly in terms of the stages. From these results, we recover as particular cases all known order conditions from the literature for first- and second-order GeCo as well as first-, second- and third-order MPRK methods. Additionally, we derive sufficient and necessary conditions in an explicit form for 3rd and 4th order GeCo schemes as well as 4th order MPRK methods. We also present a new 4th order MPRK method within this framework and numerically confirm its convergence rate.
Hamiltonian Monte Carlo (HMC) is a powerful tool for Bayesian statistical inference due to its potential to rapidly explore high dimensional state space, avoiding the random walk behavior typical of many Markov Chain Monte Carlo samplers. The proper choice of the integrator of the Hamiltonian dynamics is key to the efficiency of HMC. It is becoming increasingly clear that multi-stage splitting integrators are a good alternative to the Verlet method, traditionally used in HMC. Here we propose a principled way of finding optimal, problem-specific integration schemes (in terms of the best conservation of energy for harmonic forces/Gaussian targets) within the families of 2- and 3-stage splitting integrators. The method, which we call Adaptive Integration Approach for statistics, or s-AIA, uses a multivariate Gaussian model and simulation data obtained at the HMC burn-in stage to identify a system-specific dimensional stability interval and assigns the most appropriate 2-/3-stage integrator for any user-chosen simulation step size within that interval. s-AIA has been implemented in the in-house software package HaiCS without introducing computational overheads in the simulations. The efficiency of the s-AIA integrators and their impact on the HMC accuracy, sampling performance and convergence are discussed in comparison with known fixed-parameter multi-stage splitting integrators (including Verlet). Numerical experiments on well-known statistical models show that the adaptive schemes reach the best possible performance within the family of 2-, 3-stage splitting schemes.
Lattices are architected metamaterials whose properties strongly depend on their geometrical design. The analogy between lattices and graphs enables the use of graph neural networks (GNNs) as a faster surrogate model compared to traditional methods such as finite element modelling. In this work we present a higher-order GNN model trained to predict the fourth-order stiffness tensor of periodic strut-based lattices. The key features of the model are (i) SE(3) equivariance, and (ii) consistency with the thermodynamic law of conservation of energy. We compare the model to non-equivariant models based on a number of error metrics and demonstrate the benefits of the encoded equivariance and energy conservation in terms of predictive performance and reduced training requirements.
We propose a local modification of the standard subdiffusion model by introducing the initial Fickian diffusion, which results in a multiscale diffusion model. The developed model resolves the incompatibility between the nonlocal operators in subdiffusion and the local initial conditions and thus eliminates the initial singularity of the solutions of the subdiffusion, while retaining its heavy tail behavior away from the initial time. The well-posedness of the model and high-order regularity estimates of its solutions are analyzed by resolvent estimates, based on which the numerical discretization and analysis are performed. Numerical experiments are carried out to substantiate the theoretical findings.
The Evidential regression network (ENet) estimates a continuous target and its predictive uncertainty without costly Bayesian model averaging. However, it is possible that the target is inaccurately predicted due to the gradient shrinkage problem of the original loss function of the ENet, the negative log marginal likelihood (NLL) loss. In this paper, the objective is to improve the prediction accuracy of the ENet while maintaining its efficient uncertainty estimation by resolving the gradient shrinkage problem. A multi-task learning (MTL) framework, referred to as MT-ENet, is proposed to accomplish this aim. In the MTL, we define the Lipschitz modified mean squared error (MSE) loss function as another loss and add it to the existing NLL loss. The Lipschitz modified MSE loss is designed to mitigate the gradient conflict with the NLL loss by dynamically adjusting its Lipschitz constant. By doing so, the Lipschitz MSE loss does not disturb the uncertainty estimation of the NLL loss. The MT-ENet enhances the predictive accuracy of the ENet without losing uncertainty estimation capability on the synthetic dataset and real-world benchmarks, including drug-target affinity (DTA) regression. Furthermore, the MT-ENet shows remarkable calibration and out-of-distribution detection capability on the DTA benchmarks.