Central swaths (Q358633)

The author considers a class of extended linear programming problems where the set of non-negativity constraints are replaced with the closure of the so-called hyperbolicity cone, which is defined as the connected component of the set where hyperbolic homogeneous polynomials are positive. It is well known that one of the most popular methods for linear programming are interior point ones based on the concept of the central path. The author suggests a more general concept called the central swath, which is based on proper extensions of positive cones with the help of derivative cones where the derivatives are taken for hyperbolic polynomials. After establishing some properties of these direction sets, the author shows that the corresponding dynamics creates trajectories converging to the optimal set.