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Main Authors: Ma, Hui, Dou, Shaoyu, Liu, Ya, Xing, Fei, Feng, Li, Pi, Feng
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
Subjects:
Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.17694
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author Ma, Hui
Dou, Shaoyu
Liu, Ya
Xing, Fei
Feng, Li
Pi, Feng
author_facet Ma, Hui
Dou, Shaoyu
Liu, Ya
Xing, Fei
Feng, Li
Pi, Feng
contents With the rapid development of large language models (LLMs), an increasing number of applications leverage cloud-based LLM APIs to reduce usage costs. However, since cloud-based models' parameters and gradients are agnostic, users have to manually or use heuristic algorithms to adjust prompts for intervening LLM outputs, which requiring costly optimization procedures. In-context learning (ICL) has recently emerged as a promising paradigm that enables LLMs to adapt to new tasks using examples provided within the input, eliminating the need for parameter updates. Nevertheless, the advancement of ICL is often hindered by the lack of high-quality data, which is often sensitive and different to share. Federated learning (FL) offers a potential solution by enabling collaborative training of distributed LLMs while preserving data privacy. Despite this issues, previous FL approaches that incorporate ICL have struggled with severe straggler problems and challenges associated with heterogeneous non-identically data. To address these problems, we propose an asynchronous distributed bilevel tuning (AsynDBT) algorithm that optimizes both in-context learning samples and prompt fragments based on the feedback from the LLM, thereby enhancing downstream task performance. Benefiting from its distributed architecture, AsynDBT provides privacy protection and adaptability to heterogeneous computing environments. Furthermore, we present a theoretical analysis establishing the convergence guarantees of the proposed algorithm. Extensive experiments conducted on multiple benchmark datasets demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of AsynDBT.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_17694
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle AsynDBT: Asynchronous Distributed Bilevel Tuning for efficient In-Context Learning with Large Language Models
Ma, Hui
Dou, Shaoyu
Liu, Ya
Xing, Fei
Feng, Li
Pi, Feng
Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
With the rapid development of large language models (LLMs), an increasing number of applications leverage cloud-based LLM APIs to reduce usage costs. However, since cloud-based models' parameters and gradients are agnostic, users have to manually or use heuristic algorithms to adjust prompts for intervening LLM outputs, which requiring costly optimization procedures. In-context learning (ICL) has recently emerged as a promising paradigm that enables LLMs to adapt to new tasks using examples provided within the input, eliminating the need for parameter updates. Nevertheless, the advancement of ICL is often hindered by the lack of high-quality data, which is often sensitive and different to share. Federated learning (FL) offers a potential solution by enabling collaborative training of distributed LLMs while preserving data privacy. Despite this issues, previous FL approaches that incorporate ICL have struggled with severe straggler problems and challenges associated with heterogeneous non-identically data. To address these problems, we propose an asynchronous distributed bilevel tuning (AsynDBT) algorithm that optimizes both in-context learning samples and prompt fragments based on the feedback from the LLM, thereby enhancing downstream task performance. Benefiting from its distributed architecture, AsynDBT provides privacy protection and adaptability to heterogeneous computing environments. Furthermore, we present a theoretical analysis establishing the convergence guarantees of the proposed algorithm. Extensive experiments conducted on multiple benchmark datasets demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of AsynDBT.
title AsynDBT: Asynchronous Distributed Bilevel Tuning for efficient In-Context Learning with Large Language Models
topic Machine Learning
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.17694