Decentralized Machine Learning with Centralized Performance Guarantees via Gibbs Algorithms

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Bermudez, Yaiza, Perlaza, Samir M., Esnaola, Iñaki
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Bermudez, Yaiza
Perlaza, Samir M.
Esnaola, Iñaki
author_facet Bermudez, Yaiza
Perlaza, Samir M.
Esnaola, Iñaki
contents In this paper, it is shown, for the first time, that centralized performance is achievable in decentralized learning without sharing the local datasets. Specifically, when clients adopt an empirical risk minimization with relative-entropy regularization (ERM-RER) learning framework and a forward-backward communication between clients is established, it suffices to share the locally obtained Gibbs measures to achieve the same performance as that of a centralized ERM-RER with access to all the datasets. The core idea is that the Gibbs measure produced by client~$k$ is used, as reference measure, by client~$k+1$. This effectively establishes a principled way to encode prior information through a reference measure. In particular, achieving centralized performance in the decentralized setting requires a specific scaling of the regularization factors with the local sample sizes. Overall, this result opens the door to novel decentralized learning paradigms that shift the collaboration strategy from sharing data to sharing the local inductive bias via the reference measures over the set of models.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_20492
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Decentralized Machine Learning with Centralized Performance Guarantees via Gibbs Algorithms
Bermudez, Yaiza
Perlaza, Samir M.
Esnaola, Iñaki
Machine Learning
Information Theory
In this paper, it is shown, for the first time, that centralized performance is achievable in decentralized learning without sharing the local datasets. Specifically, when clients adopt an empirical risk minimization with relative-entropy regularization (ERM-RER) learning framework and a forward-backward communication between clients is established, it suffices to share the locally obtained Gibbs measures to achieve the same performance as that of a centralized ERM-RER with access to all the datasets. The core idea is that the Gibbs measure produced by client~$k$ is used, as reference measure, by client~$k+1$. This effectively establishes a principled way to encode prior information through a reference measure. In particular, achieving centralized performance in the decentralized setting requires a specific scaling of the regularization factors with the local sample sizes. Overall, this result opens the door to novel decentralized learning paradigms that shift the collaboration strategy from sharing data to sharing the local inductive bias via the reference measures over the set of models.
title Decentralized Machine Learning with Centralized Performance Guarantees via Gibbs Algorithms
topic Machine Learning
Information Theory
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.20492