Applications of symmetric derivatives in mathematical programming

In recent times the Kuhn—Tucker optimality conditions and the duality theorems for convex programming have been extended by generalizations of the convexity concept. In this paper the notion of a symmetric derivative for a function of several variables is introduced and used to provide extensions of some fundamental optimality and duality theorems of convex programming. Symmetric derivatives are also used to extend some optimality and duality theorems involving pseudoconvexity and differentiable quasiconvexity.