# Enlargements of the Moreau-Rockafellar Subdifferential

### Date: July 15, 2020 at 10:00

Abstract: The Moreau-Rockafellar subdifferential is a highly important notion in convex analysis and optimization theory. But there are many functions which fail to be subdifferentiable at certain points. In particular, there is a continuous convex function defined on $\ell^2(\mathbb{N})$, whose Moreau–Rockafellar subdifferential is empty at every point of its domain. This talk proposes some enlargements of the Moreau-Rockafellar subdifferential: the sup$^\star$-subdifferential, sup-subdifferential and symmetric subdifferential, all of them being nonempty for the mentioned function. These enlargements satisfy the most fundamental properties of the Moreau–Rockafellar subdifferential: convexity, weak$^*$-closedness, weak$^*$-compactness and, under some additional assumptions, possess certain calculus rules. The sup$^\star$ and sup subdifferentials coincide with the Moreau–Rockafellar subdifferential at every point at which the function attains its minimum, and if the function is upper semi-continuous, then there are some relationships for the other points. They can be used to detect minima and maxima of arbitrary functions.

The slides of the conference can be downloaded here.

Venue: Online via Google Meet – meet.google.com/unx-gcse-wkn

A brief biography of the speaker: Michel Théra is a French mathematician. He obtained his PhD from the Université de Pau et des Pays de l’Adour (1978) and his thèse d’Etat at the University of Panthéon-Sorbonne (1988). Former President of the French Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics, he has been also Vice President of the University of Limoges in charge of the International Cooperation. He is presently a professor emeritus of Mathematics in the Laboratory XLIM from the University of Limoges, where he retired as Professeur de classe exceptionnelle. He became Adjoint Professor of Federation University Australia, chairing there the International Academic Advisory Group of the Centre for Informatics and Applied Optimisation (CIAO). He is also scientific co-director of the International School of Mathematics “Guido Stampacchia” at the“Ettore Majorana” Foundation and Centre for Scientific Culture (Erice, Sicily). During several years, he has been a member of the Committee for the Developing Countries of the European Mathematical Society and became after his term an associate member. His research focuses on variational analysis, convex analysis, continuous optimization, monotone operator theory and the interaction among these fields of research, and their applications. He has published 130 articles in international journals on various topics related to variational analysis, optimization, monotone operator theory and nonlinear functional analysis. He serves as editor for several journals on continuous optimization and has been responsible for several international research programs until his retirement.

Coordinators: Abderrahim Hantoute and Fabián Flores-Bazán (DIM-UdeC)