Optimal approximation of a large matrix by a sum of projected linear mappings on prescribed subspaces

TL;DR

This paper introduces a matrix reduction method for optimally approximating large matrices by sums of projected linear mappings, reducing computational complexity by focusing on smaller matrices.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel approach to compute optimal matrix approximations using projections, avoiding large matrix pseudoinverses and improving efficiency.

Findings

Optimal approximation via projected mappings is achieved by specific pseudoinverses.

The method reduces computational burden by focusing on smaller matrices.

The approach is justified theoretically and applicable to large matrices.

Abstract

We propose and justify a matrix reduction method for calculating the optimal approximation of an observed matrix $A \in {\mathbb C}^{m \times n}$ by a sum $\sum_{i=1}^p \sum_{j=1}^q B_iX_{ij}C_j$ of matrix products where each $B_i \in {\mathbb C}^{m \times g_i}$ and $C_j \in {\mathbb C}^{h_j \times n}$ is known and where the unknown matrix kernels $X_{ij}$ are determined by minimizing the Frobenius norm of the error. The sum can be represented as a bounded linear mapping $BXC$ with unknown kernel $X$ from a prescribed subspace ${\mathcal T} \subseteq {\mathbb C}^n$ onto a prescribed subspace ${\mathcal S} \subseteq {\mathbb C}^m$ defined respectively by the collective domains and ranges of the given matrices $C_1,\ldots,C_q$ and $B_1,\ldots,B_p$. We show that the optimal kernel is $X = B^{\dag}AC^{\dag}$ and that the optimal approximation $BB^{\dag}AC^{\dag}C$ is the projection of the observed mapping $A$ onto a mapping from ${\mathcal T}$ to ${\mathcal S}$. If $A$ is large $B$ and $C$ may also be large and direct calculation of $B^{\dag}$ and $C^{\dag}$ becomes unwieldy and inefficient. { The proposed method avoids} this difficulty by reducing the solution process to finding the pseudo-inverses of a collection of much smaller matrices. This significantly reduces the computational burden.