ROBUST SOLUTIONS TO LEAST-SQUARES PROBLEMS WITH
UNCERTAIN DATA
∗
LAURENT EL GHAOUI
†
AND HERV
´
E LEBRET
†
SIAM J. M
ATRIX ANAL. APPL.
c
1997 Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
Vol. 18, No. 4, pp. 1035–1064, October 1997 015
Abstract. We consider least-squares problems where the coefficient matrices A, b are unknown
but bounded. We minimize the worst-case residual error using (convex) second-order cone program-
ming, yielding an algorithm with complexity similar to one singular value decomposition of A. The
method can be interpreted as a Tikhonov regularization procedure, with the advantage that it pro-
vides an exact bound on the robustness of solution and a rigorous way to compute the regularization
parameter. When the perturbation has a known (e.g., Toeplitz) structure, the same problem can be
solved in polynomial-time using semidefinite programming (SDP). We also consider the case when
A, b are rational functions of an unknown-but-bounded perturbation vector. We show how to mini-
mize (via SDP) upper bounds on the optimal worst-case residual. We provide numerical examples,
including one from robust identification and one from robust interpolation.
Key words. least-squares problems, uncertainty, robustness, second-order cone programming,
semidefinite programming, ill-conditioned problem, regularization, robust identification, robust in-
terpolation
AMS subject classifications. 15A06, 65F10, 65F35, 65K10, 65Y20
PII. S0895479896298130
Notation. For a matrix X, kXk denotes the largest singular value and kXk
F
the Frobenius norm. If x is a vector, max
i
|x
i
| is denoted by kxk
∞
. For a matrix A,
A
†
denotes the Moore–Penrose pseudoinverse of A. For a square matrix S, S ≥ 0
(resp., S>0) means S is symmetric and positive semidefinite (resp., definite). For
S ≥ 0, S
1/2
denotes the symmetric square root of S.ForS>0, and given vector
x, we define kxk
S
= kS
−1/2
xk. The notation I
p
denotes the p × p identity matrix;
sometimes the subscript is omitted when it can be inferred from context. For given
matrices X, Y, the notation X ⊕ Y refers to the block-diagonal matrix with X, Y as
diagonal blocks.
1. Introduction. Consider the problem of finding a solution x to an overdeter-
mined set of equations Ax ' b, where the data matrices A ∈ R
n×m
, b ∈ R
n
are
given. The least squares (LS) fit minimizes the residual k∆bk subject to Ax = b +∆b,
resulting in a consistent linear model of the form (A, b +∆b) that is closest to the
original one (in the Euclidean norm sense). The total least squares (TLS) solution
described by Golub and Van Loan [17] finds the smallest error k[∆A ∆b]k
F
subject to
the consistency equation (A +∆A)x= b+∆b. The resulting closest consistent linear
model (A +∆A, b +∆b) is even more accurate than the LS one, since modifications
of A are allowed.
Accuracy is the primary aim of LS and TLS, so it is not surprising that both
solutions may exhibit very sensitive behavior to perturbations in the data matrices
(A, b). Detailed sensitivity analyses for the LS and TLS problems may be found
in [12, 18, 2, 44, 22, 14]. Many regularization methods have been proposed to decrease
sensitivity and make LS and TLS applicable. Most regularization schemes for LS,
including Tikhonov regularization [43], amount to solve a weighted LS problem for
∗
Received by the editors February 7, 1996; accepted for publication (in revised form) by S. Van
Huffel November 4, 1996.
http://www.siam.org/journals/simax/18-4/29813.html
†
Ecole Nationale Sup´erieure de Techniques Avanc´ees, 32, Bd. Victor, 75739 Paris C´edex 15,
France (elghaoui@ensta.fr, lebret@ensta.fr).
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