Ekeland's variational principle, minimax theorems and existence of nonconvex equilibria in complete metric spaces

In this paper, we introduce the concept of τ-function which generalizes the concept of w-distance studied in the literature. We establish a generalized Ekeland's variational principle in the setting of lower semicontinuous from above and τ-functions. As applications of our Ekeland's variational principle, we derive generalized Caristi's (common) fixed point theorems, a generalized Takahashi's nonconvex minimization theorem, a nonconvex minimax theorem, a nonconvex equilibrium theorem and a generalized flower petal theorem for lower semicontinuous from above functions or lower semicontinuous functions in the complete metric spaces. We also prove that these theorems also imply our Ekeland's variational principle.     

An equilibrium version of set-valued Ekeland variational principle and its applications to set-valued vector equilibrium problems

By using Gerstewitz functions, we establish a new equilibrium version of Ekeland variational principle, which improves the related results by weakening both the lower boundedness and the lower semi-continuity of the ob jective bimaps. Applying the new version of Ekeland principle, we obtain some existence theorems on solutions for set-valued vector equilibrium problems, where the most used assumption on compactness of domains is weakened. In the setting of complete metric spaces(Z,d), we present an existence result of solutions for set-valued vector equilibrium problems, which only requires that the domain XZ is countably compact in any Hausdorff topology weaker than that induced by d. When(Z, d) is a Féchet space(i.e., a complete metrizable locally convex space), our existence result only requires that the domain XZ is weakly compact. Furthermore, in the setting of non-compact domains, we deduce several existence theorems on solutions for set-valued vector equilibrium problems,which extend and improve the related known results.     

Invex equilibrium problems

In this paper, we introduce a new class of equilibrium problems, known as invex equilibrium problems in the setting of invexity. This class of equilibrium problems includes equilibrium problems, variational inequalities and variational-like inequalities as special cases. We use the auxiliary principle technique to suggest and analyze some iterative schemes for solving invex equilibrium problems and study the convergence criteria of these methods under some mild conditions. We also consider the concept of well-posedness for invex equilibrium problems. Our results represent significant and important refinements of the previously known results.     

Ekeland’s variational principle for vectorial multivalued mappings in a uniform space

In this paper, we establish Ekeland’s variational principle and an equilibrium version of Ekeland’s variational principle for vectorial multivalued mappings in the setting of separated, sequentially complete uniform spaces. Our approaches and results are different from those in Chen et al. (2008), Hamel (2005), and Lin and Chuang (2010) [13], [14] and [15]. As applications of our results, we study vectorial Caristi’s fixed point theorems and Takahashi’s nonconvex minimization theorems for multivalued mappings and their equivalent forms in a separated, sequentially complete uniform space. We also apply our results to study maximal element theorems, which are unified methods of several variational inclusion problems. Our results contain many known results in the literature Fang (1996) [21], and will have many applications in nonlinear analysis.     

Ekeland type variational principle with applications to quasi-variational inclusion problems

In this paper, we study the Ekeland type variational principle, a Caristi-Kirk type fixed point theorem and a maximal element theorem in the setting of uniform spaces. By using these results, we establish some existence results for solutions of quasi-variational inclusion problems, quasi-optimization problems and equilibrium problems defined on separated and sequentially complete uniformly spaces.     

Normality Condition in Elasticity

Strong local minimizers with surfaces of gradient discontinuity appear in variational problems when the energy density function is not rank-one convex. In this paper we show that the stability of such surfaces is related to the stability outside the surface via a single jump relation that can be regarded as an interchange stability condition. Although this relation appears in the setting of equilibrium elasticity theory, it is remarkably similar to the well-known normality condition that plays a central role in classical plasticity theory.     

Existence of equilibria via Ekeland's principle

In the literature, when dealing with equilibrium problems and the existence of their solutions, the most used assumptions are the convexity of the domain and the generalized convexity and monotonicity, together with some weak continuity assumptions, of the function. In this paper, we focus on conditions that do not involve any convexity concept, neither for the domain nor for the function involved. Starting from the well-known Ekeland's theorem for minimization problems, we find a suitable set of conditions on the function f that lead to an Ekeland's variational principle for equilibrium problems. Via the existence of ε-solutions, we are able to show existence of equilibria on general closed sets for equilibrium problems and systems of equilibrium problems.     

Strong convergence theorems for a countable family of quasi-Lipschitzian mappings and its applications

We use the hybrid method in mathematical programming to obtain strong convergence to common fixed points of a countable family of quasi-Lipschitzian mappings. As a consequence, several convergence theorems for quasi-nonexpansive mappings and asymptotically κ-strict pseudo-contractions are deduced. We also establish strong convergence of iterative sequences for finding a common element of the set of fixed point, the set of solutions of an equilibrium problem, and the set of solutions of a variational inequality. With an appropriate setting, we obtain the corresponding results due to Tada-Takahashi and Nakajo-Shimoji-Takahashi.     

Some remarks on the Minty vector variational principle

In scalar optimization it is well known that a solution of a Minty variational inequality of differential type is a solution of the related optimization problem. This relation is known as “Minty variational principle.” In the vector case, the links between Minty variational inequalities and vector optimization problems were investigated in [F. Giannessi, On Minty variational principle, in: New Trends in Mathematical Programming, Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht, 1997, pp. 93-99] and subsequently in [X.M. Yang, X.Q. Yang, K.L. Teo, Some remarks on the Minty vector variational inequality, J. Optim. Theory Appl. 121 (2004) 193-201]. In these papers, in the particular case of a differentiable objective function f taking values in Rm and a Pareto ordering cone, it has been shown that the vector Minty variational principle holds for pseudoconvex functions. In this paper we extend such results to the case of an arbitrary ordering cone and a nondifferentiable objective function, distinguishing two different kinds of solutions of a vector optimization problem, namely ideal (or absolute) efficient points and weakly efficient points. Further, we point out that in the vector case, the Minty variational principle cannot be extended to quasiconvex functions.     

Sensitivity analysis for abstract equilibrium problems

We develop the general framework of sensitivity analysis for equilibrium problems in the setting of vector topological normed space. Our approach does not make any recourse to geometrical properties and the obtained result can be viewed as an extension and generalization of the well-known results (on variational inequalities) in the literature. Even though we have worked under arbitrary constraints Kλ with Hölder-property—that have been decisive in our treatment—we have obtained, in a similar spirit of Domokos [J. Math. Anal. Appl. 230 (1999) 382-389], the best lower bound for the continuity modulus despite of the properties of the boundary of Kλ.     

Preparation of Papers

We motivate the study of a vector variational inequality by a practical flow equilibrium problem on a network, namely a generalization of the well-known Wardrop equilibrium principle. Both weak and strong forms of the vector variational inequality are discussed and their relationships to a vector optimization problem are established under various convexity assumptions.     

Vectorial Ekeland variational principle for systems of equilibrium problems and its applications

For a family of vector-valued bifunctions,we introduce the notion of sequentially lower monotonity,which is strictly weaker than the lower semi-continuity of the second variables of the bifunctions.Then,we give a general version of vectorial Ekeland variational principle(briefly,denoted by EVP) for a system of equilibrium problems,where the sequentially lower monotone objective bifunction family is defined on products of sequentially lower complete spaces(concerning sequentially lower complete spaces,see Zhu et al(2013)),and taking values in a quasi-ordered locally convex space.Besides,the perturbation consists of a subset of the ordering cone and a family {p_i}_(i∈I) of negative functions satisfying for each i∈I,p_i(x_i,y_i) = 0 if and only if x_i=y_i.From the general version,we can deduce several particular equilibrium versions of EVP,which can be applied to show the existence of solutions for countable systems of equilibrium problems.In particular,we obtain a general existence result of solutions for countable systems of equilibrium problems in the setting of sequentially lower complete spaces.By weakening the compactness of domains and the lower semi-continuity of objective bifunctions,we extend and improve some known existence results of solutions for countable system of equilibrium problems in the setting of complete metric spaces(or Fréchet spaces).When the domains are non-compact,by using the theory of angelic spaces(see Floret(1980)),we generalize some existence results on solutions for countable systems of equilibrium problems by extending the framework from reflexive Banach spaces to the strong duals of weakly compactly generated spaces.     

Variational inclusions problems with applications to Ekeland’s variational principle,fixed point and optimization problems

In this paper, we prove the existence theorems of two types of systems of variational inclusions problem. From these existence results, we establish Ekeland’s variational principle on topological vector space, existence theorems of common fixed point, existence theorems for the semi-infinite problems, mathematical programs with fixed points and equilibrium constraints, and vector mathematical programs with variational inclusions constraints.     

Evolutionary Variational Formulation for Oligopolistic Market Equilibrium Problems with Production Excesses

The paper is devoted to generalize a previous model of the dynamic oligopolistic market equilibrium problem allowing the presence of production excesses and assuming, in a more reasonable way that the total amounts of commodity shipments from a firm to all the demand markets be upper bounded. First, we give equilibrium conditions in terms of the well-known dynamic Cournot–Nash equilibrium principle. Then we show that such conditions can be expressed in terms of Lagrange multipliers; namely, by means of an utility function, prove that both equilibrium conditions can be equivalently expressed by a variational inequality. The variational formulation allows us to provide existence theorems and qualitative properties for equilibrium solutions. At last, a numerical example illustrates the results obtained.     

Applications of Ky Fan's inequality on σ-compact set to variational inclusion and n-person game theory

In this paper, Ky Fan's inequality on σ-compact set is applied to variational inclusions and n-person game theory. We give results of some variational inclusions and existence of non-cooperative equilibrium in n-person game on σ-compact set.     

A new iterative scheme for fixed point problems of infinite family of κ i -pseudo contractive mappings, equilibrium problem, variational inequality problems

In this paper, we modify the set of variational inequality to construct a new iterative scheme for finding a common element of the set of fixed point problems of infinite family of κ _i -pseudo-contractive mappings and the set of equilibrium problem and two set of variational inequality problems.     

Stochastic variational inequalities: single-stage to multistage

Variational inequality modeling, analysis and computations are important for many applications, but much of the subject has been developed in a deterministic setting with no uncertainty in a problem’s data. In recent years research has proceeded on a track to incorporate stochasticity in one way or another. However, the main focus has been on rather limited ideas of what a stochastic variational inequality might be. Because variational inequalities are especially tuned to capturing conditions for optimality and equilibrium, stochastic variational inequalities ought to provide such service for problems of optimization and equilibrium in a stochastic setting. Therefore they ought to be able to deal with multistage decision processes involving actions that respond to increasing levels of information. Critical for that, as discovered in stochastic programming, is introducing nonanticipativity as an explicit constraint on responses along with an associated “multiplier” element which captures the “price of information” and provides a means of decomposition as a tool in algorithmic developments. That idea is extended here to a framework which supports multistage optimization and equilibrium models while also clarifying the single-stage picture.     

Multivalued general equilibrium problems

In this paper, we use the auxiliary principle technique to suggest some new classes of iterative algorithms for solving multivalued equilibrium problems. The convergence of the proposed methods either requires partially relaxed strongly monotonicity or pseudomonotonicity. As special cases, we obtain a number of known and new results for solving various classes of equilibrium and variational inequality problems. Since multivalued equilibrium problems include equilibrium, variational inequality and complementarity problems as specials cases, our results continue to hold for these problems.     

Extragradient algorithms extended to equilibrium problems¶

We make use of the auxiliary problem principle to develop iterative algorithms for solving equilibrium problems. The first one is an extension of the extragradient algorithm to equilibrium problems. In this algorithm the equilibrium bifunction is not required to satisfy any monotonicity property, but it must satisfy a certain Lipschitz-type condition. To avoid this requirement we propose linesearch procedures commonly used in variational inequalities to obtain projection-type algorithms for solving equilibrium problems. Applications to mixed variational inequalities are discussed. A special class of equilibrium problems is investigated and some preliminary computational results are reported.     

Optimality conditions for various efficient solutions involving coderivatives: From set-valued optimization problems to set-valued equilibrium problems

We present a new approach to the study of a set-valued equilibrium problem (for short, SEP) through the study of a set-valued optimization problem with a geometric constraint (for short, SOP) based on an equivalence between solutions of these problems. As illustrations, we adapt to SEP enhanced notions of relative Pareto efficient solutions introduced in set optimization by Bao and Mordukhovich and derive from known or new optimality conditions for various efficient solutions of SOP similar results for solutions of SEP as well as for solutions of a vector equilibrium problem and a vector variational inequality.We also introduce the concept of quasi weakly efficient solutions for the above problems and divide all efficient solutions under consideration into the Pareto-type group containing Pareto efficient, primary relative efficient, intrinsic relative efficient, quasi relative efficient solutions and the weak Pareto-type group containing quasi weakly efficient, weakly efficient, strongly efficient, positive properly efficient, Henig global properly efficient, Henig properly efficient, super efficient and Benson properly efficient solutions. The necessary conditions for Pareto-type efficient solutions and necessary/sufficient conditions for weak Pareto-type efficient solutions formulated here are expressed in terms of the Ioffe approximate coderivative and normal cone in the Banach space setting and in terms of the Mordukhovich coderivative and normal cone in the Asplund space setting.