Worst-Case Convergence Time of ML Algorithms via Extreme Value Theory

This paper leverages the statistics of extreme values to predict the worst-case convergence times of machine learning algorithms. Timing is a critical non-functional property of ML systems, and providing the worst-case converge times is essential to guarantee the availability of ML and its services. However, timing properties such as worst-case convergence times (WCCT) are difficult to verify since (1) they are not encoded in the syntax or semantics of underlying programming languages of AI, (2) their evaluations depend on both algorithmic implementations and underlying systems, and (3) their measurements involve uncertainty and noise. Therefore, prevalent formal methods and statistical models fail to provide rich information on the amounts and likelihood of WCCT. Our key observation is that the timing information we seek represents the extreme tail of execution times. Therefore, extreme value theory (EVT), a statistical discipline that focuses on understanding and predicting the distribution of extreme values in the tail of outcomes, provides an ideal framework to model and analyze WCCT in the training and inference phases of ML paradigm. Building upon the mathematical tools from EVT, we propose a practical framework to predict the worst-case timing properties of ML. Over a set of linear ML training algorithms, we show that EVT achieves a better accuracy for predicting WCCTs than relevant statistical methods such as the Bayesian factor. On the set of larger machine learning training algorithms and deep neural network inference, we show the feasibility and usefulness of EVT models to accurately predict WCCTs, their expected return periods, and their likelihood.

Prior Frequency Guided Diffusion Model for Limited Angle (LA)-CBCT Reconstruction

Cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) is widely used in image-guided radiotherapy. Reconstructing CBCTs from limited-angle acquisitions (LA-CBCT) is highly desired for improved imaging efficiency, dose reduction, and better mechanical clearance. LA-CBCT reconstruction, however, suffers from severe under-sampling artifacts, making it a highly ill-posed inverse problem. Diffusion models can generate data/images by reversing a data-noising process through learned data distributions; and can be incorporated as a denoiser/regularizer in LA-CBCT reconstruction. In this study, we developed a diffusion model-based framework, prior frequency-guided diffusion model (PFGDM), for robust and structure-preserving LA-CBCT reconstruction. PFGDM uses a conditioned diffusion model as a regularizer for LA-CBCT reconstruction, and the condition is based on high-frequency information extracted from patient-specific prior CT scans which provides a strong anatomical prior for LA-CBCT reconstruction. Specifically, we developed two variants of PFGDM (PFGDM-A and PFGDM-B) with different conditioning schemes. PFGDM-A applies the high-frequency CT information condition until a pre-optimized iteration step, and drops it afterwards to enable both similar and differing CT/CBCT anatomies to be reconstructed. PFGDM-B, on the other hand, continuously applies the prior CT information condition in every reconstruction step, while with a decaying mechanism, to gradually phase out the reconstruction guidance from the prior CT scans. The two variants of PFGDM were tested and compared with current available LA-CBCT reconstruction solutions, via metrics including PSNR and SSIM. PFGDM outperformed all traditional and diffusion model-based methods. PFGDM reconstructs high-quality LA-CBCTs under very-limited gantry angles, allowing faster and more flexible CBCT scans with dose reductions.

Random walks on simplicial complexes

The notion of Laplacian of a graph can be generalized to simplicial complexes and hypergraphs, and contains information on the topology of these structures. Even for a graph, the consideration of associated simplicial complexes is interesting to understand its shape. Whereas the Laplacian of a graph has a simple probabilistic interpretation as the generator of a continuous time Markov chain on the graph, things are not so direct when considering simplicial complexes. We define here new Markov chains on simplicial complexes. For a given order~$k$, the state space is the set of $k$-cycles that are chains of $k$-simplexes with null boundary. This new framework is a natural generalization of the canonical Markov chains on graphs. We show that the generator of our Markov chain is the upper Laplacian defined in the context of algebraic topology for discrete structure. We establish several key properties of this new process: in particular, when the number of vertices is finite, the Markov chain is positive recurrent. This result is not trivial, since the cycles can loop over themselves an unbounded number of times. We study the diffusive limits when the simplicial complexes under scrutiny are a sequence of ever refining triangulations of the flat torus. Using the analogy between singular and Hodge homologies, we express this limit as valued in the set of currents. The proof of tightness and the identification of the limiting martingale problem make use of the flat norm and carefully controls of the error terms in the convergence of the generator. Uniqueness of the solution to the martingale problem is left open. An application to hole detection is carried.

Gyro-based Neural Single Image Deblurring

In this paper, we present GyroDeblurNet, a novel single image deblurring method that utilizes a gyro sensor to effectively resolve the ill-posedness of image deblurring. The gyro sensor provides valuable information about camera motion during exposure time that can significantly improve deblurring quality. However, effectively exploiting real-world gyro data is challenging due to significant errors from various sources including sensor noise, the disparity between the positions of a camera module and a gyro sensor, the absence of translational motion information, and moving objects whose motions cannot be captured by a gyro sensor. To handle gyro error, GyroDeblurNet is equipped with two novel neural network blocks: a gyro refinement block and a gyro deblurring block. The gyro refinement block refines the error-ridden gyro data using the blur information from the input image. On the other hand, the gyro deblurring block removes blur from the input image using the refined gyro data and further compensates for gyro error by leveraging the blur information from the input image. For training a neural network with erroneous gyro data, we propose a training strategy based on the curriculum learning. We also introduce a novel gyro data embedding scheme to represent real-world intricate camera shakes. Finally, we present a synthetic dataset and a real dataset for the training and evaluation of gyro-based single image deblurring. Our experiments demonstrate that our approach achieves state-of-the-art deblurring quality by effectively utilizing erroneous gyro data.

Efficient Online Unlearning via Hessian-Free Recollection of Individual Data Statistics

Machine unlearning strives to uphold the data owners' right to be forgotten by enabling models to selectively forget specific data. Recent methods suggest that one approach of data forgetting is by precomputing and storing statistics carrying second-order information to improve computational and memory efficiency. However, they rely on restrictive assumptions and the computation/storage suffer from the curse of model parameter dimensionality, making it challenging to apply to most deep neural networks. In this work, we propose a Hessian-free online unlearning method. We propose to maintain a statistical vector for each data point, computed through affine stochastic recursion approximation of the difference between retrained and learned models. Our proposed algorithm achieves near-instantaneous online unlearning as it only requires a vector addition operation. Based on the strategy that recollecting statistics for forgetting data, the proposed method significantly reduces the unlearning runtime. Experimental studies demonstrate that the proposed scheme surpasses existing results by orders of magnitude in terms of time and memory costs, while also enhancing accuracy.

Streamlined Photoacoustic Image Processing with Foundation Models: A Training-Free Solution

Foundation models have rapidly evolved and have achieved significant accomplishments in computer vision tasks. Specifically, the prompt mechanism conveniently allows users to integrate image prior information into the model, making it possible to apply models without any training. Therefore, we propose a method based on foundation models and zero training to solve the tasks of photoacoustic (PA) image segmentation. We employed the segment anything model (SAM) by setting simple prompts and integrating the model's outputs with prior knowledge of the imaged objects to accomplish various tasks, including: (1) removing the skin signal in three-dimensional PA image rendering; (2) dual speed-of-sound reconstruction, and (3) segmentation of finger blood vessels. Through these demonstrations, we have concluded that deep learning can be directly applied in PA imaging without the requirement for network design and training. This potentially allows for a hands-on, convenient approach to achieving efficient and accurate segmentation of PA images. This letter serves as a comprehensive tutorial, facilitating the mastery of the technique through the provision of code and sample datasets.

ResearchAgent: Iterative Research Idea Generation over Scientific Literature with Large Language Models

Scientific Research, vital for improving human life, is hindered by its inherent complexity, slow pace, and the need for specialized experts. To enhance its productivity, we propose a ResearchAgent, a large language model-powered research idea writing agent, which automatically generates problems, methods, and experiment designs while iteratively refining them based on scientific literature. Specifically, starting with a core paper as the primary focus to generate ideas, our ResearchAgent is augmented not only with relevant publications through connecting information over an academic graph but also entities retrieved from an entity-centric knowledge store based on their underlying concepts, mined and shared across numerous papers. In addition, mirroring the human approach to iteratively improving ideas with peer discussions, we leverage multiple ReviewingAgents that provide reviews and feedback iteratively. Further, they are instantiated with human preference-aligned large language models whose criteria for evaluation are derived from actual human judgments. We experimentally validate our ResearchAgent on scientific publications across multiple disciplines, showcasing its effectiveness in generating novel, clear, and valid research ideas based on human and model-based evaluation results.

CAT: Contrastive Adapter Training for Personalized Image Generation

The emergence of various adapters, including Low-Rank Adaptation (LoRA) applied from the field of natural language processing, has allowed diffusion models to personalize image generation at a low cost. However, due to the various challenges including limited datasets and shortage of regularization and computation resources, adapter training often results in unsatisfactory outcomes, leading to the corruption of the backbone model's prior knowledge. One of the well known phenomena is the loss of diversity in object generation, especially within the same class which leads to generating almost identical objects with minor variations. This poses challenges in generation capabilities. To solve this issue, we present Contrastive Adapter Training (CAT), a simple yet effective strategy to enhance adapter training through the application of CAT loss. Our approach facilitates the preservation of the base model's original knowledge when the model initiates adapters. Furthermore, we introduce the Knowledge Preservation Score (KPS) to evaluate CAT's ability to keep the former information. We qualitatively and quantitatively compare CAT's improvement. Finally, we mention the possibility of CAT in the aspects of multi-concept adapter and optimization.

LLoCO: Learning Long Contexts Offline

Processing long contexts remains a challenge for large language models (LLMs) due to the quadratic computational and memory overhead of the self-attention mechanism and the substantial KV cache sizes during generation. We propose a novel approach to address this problem by learning contexts offline through context compression and in-domain parameter-efficient finetuning. Our method enables an LLM to create a concise representation of the original context and efficiently retrieve relevant information to answer questions accurately. We introduce LLoCO, a technique that combines context compression, retrieval, and parameter-efficient finetuning using LoRA. Our approach extends the effective context window of a 4k token LLaMA2-7B model to handle up to 128k tokens. We evaluate our approach on several long-context question-answering datasets, demonstrating that LLoCO significantly outperforms in-context learning while using $30\times$ fewer tokens during inference. LLoCO achieves up to $7.62\times$ speed-up and substantially reduces the cost of long document question answering, making it a promising solution for efficient long context processing. Our code is publicly available at https://github.com/jeffreysijuntan/lloco.

Mutual Information Optimization for SIM-Based Holographic MIMO Systems

In the context of emerging stacked intelligent metasurface (SIM)-based holographic MIMO (HMIMO) systems, a fundamental problem is to study the mutual information (MI) between transmitted and received signals to establish their capacity. However, direct optimization or analytical evaluation of the MI, particularly for discrete signaling, is often intractable. To address this challenge, we adopt the channel cutoff rate (CR) as an alternative optimization metric for the MI maximization. In this regard, we propose an alternating projected gradient method (APGM), which optimizes the CR of a SIM-based HMIMO system by adjusting signal precoding and the phase shifts across the transmit and receive SIMs in a layer-by-layer basis. Simulation results indicate that the proposed algorithm significantly enhances the CR, achieving substantial gains proportional to those observed for the corresponding MI. This justifies the effectiveness of using the channel CR for the MI optimization. Moreover, we demonstrate that the integration of digital precoding, even on a modest scale, has a significant impact on the ultimate performance of SIM-aided systems.