May 18 – 22, 2026
Virginia Tech
America/New_York timezone

Randomized Row Norm Estimation: Algorithms and Applications

May 22, 2026, 9:10 AM
25m
McBryde Hall 129 (Virginia Tech)

McBryde Hall 129

Virginia Tech

Minisymposium Talk Polynomials, Krylov Methods and Applications Polynomials, Krylov Methods and Applications

Speaker

Alexander Hsu (University of Washington)

Description

Computing the diagonal entries of a large linear operator is a common computational primitive in numerical linear algebra, with applications in uncertainty quantification, cross-validation, perturbation analysis, electronic structure calculation and more. However, estimating the diagonals of a matrix given only implicit matrix-vector access is challenging, as randomized algorithms suffer from high variance. In many cases, these problems can be efficiently reduced to estimating the squared row norms of a suitable square root of the matrix, where randomized algorithms specialized to row norm estimation with considerably lower variance may be applied. In particular, when the matrix in question is a function of another matrix, that is, $A = f(B)$, and matrix vector products with $A$ are computed using a Krylov method, it is often the case that matrix vector products with $f^{1/2}(B)$ can be computed just as efficiently those with $f(B)$. We present algorithms for estimating squared row norms and approaches for incorporating them into other computational tasks.

Author

Alexander Hsu (University of Washington)

Co-author

Ethan Epperly (UC Berkeley)

Presentation materials

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