Global Optimization via the Dual SONC Cone and Linear Programming

Abstract: Using the dual cone of sums of nonnegative circuits (SONC), we provide a relaxation of the global optimization problem to minimize an exponential sum and, as a special case, a multivariate real polynomial. Our approach builds on two key observations. First, that the dual SONC cone is contained in the primal one. Hence, containment in this cone is a certificate of nonnegativity. Second, we show that membership in the dual cone can be verified by a linear program. We implement the algorithm and present initial experimental results comparing our method to existing approaches.