This survey covers the state of the art of techniques for solving general purpose constrained global optimization problems and continuous constraint satisfaction problems, with emphasis on complete techniques that provably nd all solutions (if there are nitely many). The core of the material is presented in sucient detail that the survey may serve as a text for teaching constrained global optimization.

. Quadratic optimization comprises one of the most important areas of nonlinear programming. Numerous problems in real world applications, including problems in planning and scheduling, economies of scale, and engineering design, and control are naturally expressed as quadratic problems. Moreover, the quadratic problem is known to be NP-hard, which makes this one of the most interesting and challenging class of optimization problems. In this chapter, we review various properties of the quadratic problem, and discuss different techniques for solving various classes of quadratic problems. Some of the more successful algorithms for solving the special cases of bound constrained and large scale quadratic problems are considered. Examples of various applications of quadratic programming are presented. A summary of the available computational results for the algorithms to solve the various classes of problems is presented. Key words: Quadratic optimization, bilinear programming, concave pro...

The NP-complete problem of determining whether two disjoint point sets in the n-dimensional real space R n can be separated by two planes is cast as a bilinear program, that is minimizing the scalar product of two linear functions on a polyhedral set. The bilinear program, which has a vertex solution, is processed by an iterative linear programming algorithm that terminates in a finite number of steps at a point satisfying a necessary optimality condition or at a global minimum. Encouraging computational experience on a number of test problems is reported.

. A new approach is proposed for finding all ffl--feasible solutions for certain classes of nonlinearly constrained systems of equations. By introducing slack variables, the initial problem is transformed into a global optimization problem(P) whose multiple global minimum solutionswith a zero objectivevalue (if any)correspond to all solutionsof the initial constrainedsystem of equalities. All ffl--globally optimal points of (P) are then localized within a set of arbitrarily small disjoint rectangles. This is based on a branch and bound type global optimization algorithm which attains finite ffl--convergence to each of the multiple global minima of (P) through the successive refinement of a convexrelaxation of the feasible region and the subsequent solution of a series of nonlinear convex optimization problems. Based on the form of the participating functions, a number of techniques for constructing this convex relaxation are proposed. By taking advantage of the properties of products o...

We present a branch and cut algorithm that yields in finite time, a globally ffl-optimal solution (with respect to feasibility and optimality) of the nonconvex quadratically constrained quadratic programming problem. The idea is to estimate all quadratic terms by successive linearizations within a branching tree using Reformulation-Linearization Techniques (RLT). To do so, four classes of linearizations (cuts), depending on one to three parameters, are detailed. For each class, we show how to select the best member with respect to a precise criterion. The cuts introduced at any node of the tree are valid in the whole tree, and not only within the subtree rooted at that node. In order to enhance the computational speed, the structure created at any node of the tree is flexible enough to be used at other nodes. Computational results are reported. Some problems of the literature are solved, for the first time with a proof of global optimality.

Many nonconvex nonlinear programming (NLP) problems of practical interest involve bilinear terms and linear constraints, as well as, potentially, other convex and nonconvex terms and constraints. In such cases, it may be possible to augment the formulation with additional linear constraints (a subset of Reformulation-Linearization Technique constraints) which do not a#ect the feasible region of the original NLP but tighten that of its convex relaxation to the extent that some bilinear terms may be dropped from the problem formulation. We present an e#cient graph-theoretical algorithm for e#ecting such exact reformulations of large, sparse NLPs. The global solution of the reformulated problem using spatial Branchand Bound algorithms is usually significantly faster than that of the original NLP. We illustrate this point by applying our algorithm to a set of pooling and blending global optimization problems.

Summary. Mathematical programming is a language for describing optimization problems; it is based on parameters, decision variables, objective function(s) subject to various types of constraints. The present treatment is concerned with the case when objective(s) and constraints are algebraic mathematical expressions of the parameters and decision variables, and therefore excludes optimization of black-box functions. A reformulation of a mathematical program P is a mathematical program Q obtained from P via symbolic transformations applied to the sets of variables, objectives and constraints. We present a survey of existing reformulations interpreted along these lines, some example applications, and describe the implementation of a software framework for reformulation and optimization. 1

A reformulation of a mathematical program is a formulation which shares some properties with, but is in some sense better than, the original program. Reformulations are important with respect to the choice and efficiency of the solution algorithms; furthermore, it is desirable that reformulations can be carried out automatically. Reformulation techniques are very common in mathematical programming but interestingly they have never been studied under a common framework. This paper attempts to move some steps in this direction. We define a framework for storing and manipulating mathematical programming formulations, give several fundamental definitions categorizing reformulations in essentially four types (opt-reformulations, narrowings, relaxations and approximations). We establish some theoretical results and give reformulation examples for each type.

Recently Kojima and Tuncel proposed new successive convex relaxation methods and their localized-discretized variants for general nonconvex quadratic optimization problems. Although an upper bound of the optimal objective function value within a previously given precision can be found theoretically by solving a finite number of linear programs, several important implementation issues remain unsolved. In this paper, we discuss those issues, present practically implementable algorithms and report numerical results.

We define a convex extension of a lower-semicontinuous function to be a convex function that is identical to the given function over a pre-specified subset of its domain. Convex extensions are not necessarily constructible or unique. We identify conditions under which a convex extension can be constructed. When multiple convex extensions exist, we characterize the tightest convex extension in a well-defined sense. Using the notion of a generating set, we establish conditions under which the tightest convex extension is the convex envelope. Then, we employ convex extensions to develop a constructive technique for deriving convex envelopes of nonlinear functions. Finally, using the theory of convex extensions we characterize the precise gaps exhibited by various underestimators of x/y over a rectangle and prove that the extensions theory provides convex relaxations that are much tighter than the relaxation provided by the classical outer-linearization of bilinear terms.