{"681355":{"#nid":"681355","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Three Hundred Years Later, a Tool from Isaac Newton Gets an Update","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EEvery day, researchers search for optimal solutions. They might want to figure out where to build a major airline hub. Or to determine how to maximize return while minimizing risk in an investment portfolio. Or to develop self-driving cars that can distinguish between traffic lights and stop signs.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EMathematically, these problems get translated into a search for the minimum values of functions. But in all these scenarios, the functions are too complicated to assess directly. Researchers have to approximate the minimal values instead.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EIt turns out that one of the best ways to do this is by using an algorithm that Isaac Newton developed over 300 years ago. This algorithm is fairly simple. It\u2019s a little like searching, blindfolded, for the lowest point in an unfamiliar landscape. As you put one foot in front of the other, the only information you need is whether you\u2019re going uphill or downhill, and whether the grade is increasing or decreasing. Using that information, you can get a good approximation of the minimum relatively quickly.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EAlthough enormously powerful \u2014 centuries later, Newton\u2019s method is still crucial for solving present-day problems in logistics, finance, computer vision and even pure math \u2014 it also has a significant shortcoming. It doesn\u2019t work well on all functions. So mathematicians have continued to study the technique, figuring out different ways to broaden its scope without sacrificing efficiency.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ELast summer, three researchers \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/arxiv.org\/abs\/2311.06374\u0022 target=\u0022_blank\u0022\u003Eannounced the latest improvement\u003C\/a\u003E to Newton\u2019s method. \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/aaa.princeton.edu\/\u0022 target=\u0022_blank\u0022\u003EAmir Ali Ahmadi\u003C\/a\u003E of Princeton University, along with his former students \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/chaudhrya.github.io\/\u0022 target=\u0022_blank\u0022\u003EAbraar Chaudhry\u003C\/a\u003E (now at the Georgia Institute of Technology) and \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/medicine.yale.edu\/profile\/jeffrey-zhang\/\u0022 target=\u0022_blank\u0022\u003EJeffrey Zhang\u003C\/a\u003E (now at Yale University), extended Newton\u2019s method to work efficiently on the broadest class of functions yet.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003ERead the full story here: \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.quantamagazine.org\/three-hundred-years-later-a-tool-from-isaac-newton-gets-an-update-20250324\/\u0022\u003Ehttps:\/\/www.quantamagazine.org\/three-hundred-years-later-a-tool-from-isaac-newton-gets-an-update-20250324\/\u003C\/a\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":"","format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003E\u003Cdiv\u003EISyE Postdoctoral Fellow Abraar Chaudhry was highlighted in Quanta Magazine for his collaborative effort to enhance Newton\u2019s method, making it more efficient for tackling complex problems.\u003C\/div\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"A simple, widely used mathematical technique can finally be applied to boundlessly complex problems."}],"uid":"36284","created_gmt":"2025-03-25 15:20:32","changed_gmt":"2025-03-25 21:39:02","author":"chenriquez8","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","location":"Atlanta, GA","dateline":{"date":"2025-03-24T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2025-03-24T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"676665":{"id":"676665","type":"image","title":"Abraar Chaudhry","body":null,"created":"1742916038","gmt_created":"2025-03-25 15:20:38","changed":"1742919634","gmt_changed":"2025-03-25 16:20:34","alt":"Abraar Chaudhry","file":{"fid":"260478","name":"Abraar.png","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/2025\/03\/25\/Abraar.png","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/2025\/03\/25\/Abraar.png","mime":"image\/png","size":1879159,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/2025\/03\/25\/Abraar.png?itok=godpMdXY"}},"676666":{"id":"676666","type":"image","title":"Quantum Magazine","body":null,"created":"1742916038","gmt_created":"2025-03-25 15:20:38","changed":"1742916038","gmt_changed":"2025-03-25 15:20:38","alt":"Quantum Magazine","file":{"fid":"260479","name":"Quantum.png","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/2025\/03\/25\/Quantum.png","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/2025\/03\/25\/Quantum.png","mime":"image\/png","size":1439797,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/2025\/03\/25\/Quantum.png?itok=ktedMDqs"}}},"media_ids":["676665","676666"],"related_links":[{"url":"https:\/\/www.isye.gatech.edu\/users\/abraar-chaudhry","title":"Abraar Chaudhry, Gary C. Butler Family Postdoctoral Fellow"},{"url":"https:\/\/www.quantamagazine.org\/three-hundred-years-later-a-tool-from-isaac-newton-gets-an-update-20250324\/","title":"Full Story"}],"groups":[{"id":"1242","name":"School of Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISYE)"},{"id":"1243","name":"The Supply Chain and Logistics Institute (SCL)"}],"categories":[{"id":"135","name":"Research"}],"keywords":[{"id":"9167","name":"machine learning"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39541","name":"Systems"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EKevin Hartnett, Quanta Magazine, Contributing Writer\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":[],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}