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Documents authored by White, W. Timothy J.


Found 3 Possible Name Variants:

White, W. Timothy J.

Document
Heuristic Algorithms for the Maximum Colorful Subtree Problem

Authors: Kai Dührkop, Marie A. Lataretu, W. Timothy J. White, and Sebastian Böcker

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 113, 18th International Workshop on Algorithms in Bioinformatics (WABI 2018)


Abstract
In metabolomics, small molecules are structurally elucidated using tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS); this computational task can be formulated as the Maximum Colorful Subtree problem, which is NP-hard. Unfortunately, data from a single metabolite requires us to solve hundreds or thousands of instances of this problem - and in a single Liquid Chromatography MS/MS run, hundreds or thousands of metabolites are measured. Here, we comprehensively evaluate the performance of several heuristic algorithms for the problem. Unfortunately, as is often the case in bioinformatics, the structure of the (chemically) true solution is not known to us; therefore we can only evaluate against the optimal solution of an instance. Evaluating the quality of a heuristic based on scores can be misleading: Even a slightly suboptimal solution can be structurally very different from the optimal solution, but it is the structure of a solution and not its score that is relevant for the downstream analysis. To this end, we propose a different evaluation setup: Given a set of candidate instances of which exactly one is known to be correct, the heuristic in question solves each instance to the best of its ability, producing a score for each instance, which is then used to rank the instances. We then evaluate whether the correct instance is ranked highly by the heuristic. We find that one particular heuristic consistently ranks the correct instance in a top position. We also find that the scores of the best heuristic solutions are very close to the optimal score; in contrast, the structure of the solutions can deviate significantly from the optimal structures. Integrating the heuristic allowed us to speed up computations in practice by a factor of 100-fold.

Cite as

Kai Dührkop, Marie A. Lataretu, W. Timothy J. White, and Sebastian Böcker. Heuristic Algorithms for the Maximum Colorful Subtree Problem. In 18th International Workshop on Algorithms in Bioinformatics (WABI 2018). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 113, pp. 23:1-23:14, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2018)


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@InProceedings{duhrkop_et_al:LIPIcs.WABI.2018.23,
  author =	{D\"{u}hrkop, Kai and Lataretu, Marie A. and White, W. Timothy J. and B\"{o}cker, Sebastian},
  title =	{{Heuristic Algorithms for the Maximum Colorful Subtree Problem}},
  booktitle =	{18th International Workshop on Algorithms in Bioinformatics (WABI 2018)},
  pages =	{23:1--23:14},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-082-8},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2018},
  volume =	{113},
  editor =	{Parida, Laxmi and Ukkonen, Esko},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.WABI.2018.23},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-93256},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.WABI.2018.23},
  annote =	{Keywords: Fragmentation trees, Computational mass spectrometry}
}

White, David

Document
Accessing Databases within Esterel

Authors: David White and Gerald Luettgen

Published in: Dagstuhl Seminar Proceedings, Volume 4491, Synchronous Programming - SYNCHRON'04 (2005)


Abstract
A current limitation of the Esterel language for reactive-systems design is its lack of support for accessing databases. This talk presents the results of a summer student project which investigated a way of integrating databases and Esterel by providing an API for database use inside Esterel. A case study, involving a warehouse storage system built using Lego Mindstorms robotics kits, demonstrates the utility of the API. This system employs an Esterel-programmed robot whose task it is to collect various items from a customer's order and assemble them in one place. To do so, the robot accesses customer-order data and floor-plan data stored in a database.

Cite as

David White and Gerald Luettgen. Accessing Databases within Esterel. In Synchronous Programming - SYNCHRON'04. Dagstuhl Seminar Proceedings, Volume 4491, pp. 1-21, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2005)


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@InProceedings{white_et_al:DagSemProc.04491.3,
  author =	{White, David and Luettgen, Gerald},
  title =	{{Accessing Databases within Esterel}},
  booktitle =	{Synchronous Programming - SYNCHRON'04},
  pages =	{1--21},
  series =	{Dagstuhl Seminar Proceedings (DagSemProc)},
  ISSN =	{1862-4405},
  year =	{2005},
  volume =	{4491},
  editor =	{Stephen A. Edwards and Nicolas Halbwachs and Reinhard v. Hanxleden and Thomas Stauner},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/DagSemProc.04491.3},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-1619},
  doi =		{10.4230/DagSemProc.04491.3},
  annote =	{Keywords: database esterel lego mindstorms}
}

White, Colin

Document
Track A: Algorithms, Complexity and Games
Robust Communication-Optimal Distributed Clustering Algorithms

Authors: Pranjal Awasthi, Ainesh Bakshi, Maria-Florina Balcan, Colin White, and David P. Woodruff

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 132, 46th International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP 2019)


Abstract
In this work, we study the k-median and k-means clustering problems when the data is distributed across many servers and can contain outliers. While there has been a lot of work on these problems for worst-case instances, we focus on gaining a finer understanding through the lens of beyond worst-case analysis. Our main motivation is the following: for many applications such as clustering proteins by function or clustering communities in a social network, there is some unknown target clustering, and the hope is that running a k-median or k-means algorithm will produce clusterings which are close to matching the target clustering. Worst-case results can guarantee constant factor approximations to the optimal k-median or k-means objective value, but not closeness to the target clustering. Our first result is a distributed algorithm which returns a near-optimal clustering assuming a natural notion of stability, namely, approximation stability [Awasthi and Balcan, 2014], even when a constant fraction of the data are outliers. The communication complexity is O~(sk+z) where s is the number of machines, k is the number of clusters, and z is the number of outliers. Next, we show this amount of communication cannot be improved even in the setting when the input satisfies various non-worst-case assumptions. We give a matching Omega(sk+z) lower bound on the communication required both for approximating the optimal k-means or k-median cost up to any constant, and for returning a clustering that is close to the target clustering in Hamming distance. These lower bounds hold even when the data satisfies approximation stability or other common notions of stability, and the cluster sizes are balanced. Therefore, Omega(sk+z) is a communication bottleneck, even for real-world instances.

Cite as

Pranjal Awasthi, Ainesh Bakshi, Maria-Florina Balcan, Colin White, and David P. Woodruff. Robust Communication-Optimal Distributed Clustering Algorithms. In 46th International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP 2019). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 132, pp. 18:1-18:16, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2019)


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@InProceedings{awasthi_et_al:LIPIcs.ICALP.2019.18,
  author =	{Awasthi, Pranjal and Bakshi, Ainesh and Balcan, Maria-Florina and White, Colin and Woodruff, David P.},
  title =	{{Robust Communication-Optimal Distributed Clustering Algorithms}},
  booktitle =	{46th International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP 2019)},
  pages =	{18:1--18:16},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-109-2},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2019},
  volume =	{132},
  editor =	{Baier, Christel and Chatzigiannakis, Ioannis and Flocchini, Paola and Leonardi, Stefano},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ICALP.2019.18},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-105942},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ICALP.2019.18},
  annote =	{Keywords: robust distributed clustering, communication complexity}
}
Document
k-Center Clustering Under Perturbation Resilience

Authors: Maria-Florina Balcan, Nika Haghtalab, and Colin White

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 55, 43rd International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP 2016)


Abstract
The k-center problem is a canonical and long-studied facility location and clustering problem with many applications in both its symmetric and asymmetric forms. Both versions of the problem have tight approximation factors on worst case instances: a 2-approximation for symmetric kcenter and an O(log*(k))-approximation for the asymmetric version. Therefore to improve on these ratios, one must go beyond the worst case. In this work, we take this approach and provide strong positive results both for the asymmetric and symmetric k-center problems under a very natural input stability (promise) condition called alpha-perturbation resilience [Bilu Linial, 2012], which states that the optimal solution does not change under any alpha-factor perturbation to the input distances. We show that by assuming 2-perturbation resilience, the exact solution for the asymmetric k-center problem can be found in polynomial time. To our knowledge, this is the first problem that is hard to approximate to any constant factor in the worst case, yet can be optimally solved in polynomial time under perturbation resilience for a constant value of alpha. Furthermore, we prove our result is tight by showing symmetric k-center under (2-epsilon)-perturbation resilience is hard unless NP=RP. This is the first tight result for any problem under perturbation resilience, i.e., this is the first time the exact value of alpha for which the problem switches from being NP-hard to efficiently computable has been found. Our results illustrate a surprising relationship between symmetric and asymmetric k-center instances under perturbation resilience. Unlike approximation ratio, for which symmetric k-center is easily solved to a factor of 2 but asymmetric k-center cannot be approximated to any constant factor, both symmetric and asymmetric k-center can be solved optimally under resilience to 2-perturbations.

Cite as

Maria-Florina Balcan, Nika Haghtalab, and Colin White. k-Center Clustering Under Perturbation Resilience. In 43rd International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP 2016). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 55, pp. 68:1-68:14, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2016)


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@InProceedings{balcan_et_al:LIPIcs.ICALP.2016.68,
  author =	{Balcan, Maria-Florina and Haghtalab, Nika and White, Colin},
  title =	{{k-Center Clustering Under Perturbation Resilience}},
  booktitle =	{43rd International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP 2016)},
  pages =	{68:1--68:14},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-013-2},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2016},
  volume =	{55},
  editor =	{Chatzigiannakis, Ioannis and Mitzenmacher, Michael and Rabani, Yuval and Sangiorgi, Davide},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ICALP.2016.68},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-62160},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.ICALP.2016.68},
  annote =	{Keywords: k-center, clustering, perturbation resilience}
}
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