No abstract

We show that various inverse problems in signal recovery can be formulated as the generic problem of minimizing the sum of two convex functions with certain regularity properties. This formulation makes it possible to derive existence, uniqueness, characterization, and stability results in a unified and standardized fashion for a large class of apparently disparate problems. Recent results on monotone operator splitting methods are applied to establish the convergence of a forward-backward algorithm to solve the generic problem. In turn, we recover, extend, and provide a simplified analysis for a variety of existing iterative methods. Applications to geometry/texture image decomposition schemes are also discussed. A novelty of our framework is to use extensively the notion of a proximity operator, which was introduced by Moreau in the 1960s.

The proximity operator of a convex function is a natural extension of the notion of a projection operator onto a convex set. This tool, which plays a central role in the analysis and the numerical solution of convex optimization problems, has recently been introduced in the arena of inverse problems and, especially, in signal processing, where it has become increasingly important. In this paper, we review the basic properties of proximity operators which are relevant to signal processing and present optimization methods based on these operators. These proximal splitting methods are shown to capture and extend several well-known algorithms in a unifying framework. Applications of proximal methods in signal recovery and synthesis are discussed.