Worst-case generation via minimax optimization in Wasserstein space
Worst-case generation plays a critical role in evaluating robustness and stress-testing systems under distribution shifts, in applications ranging from machine learning models to power grids and medical prediction systems. We develop a generative modeling framework based on min-max optimization over continuous probability distributions, namely the Wasserstein space. Unlike traditional discrete distributionally robust optimization approaches, which often suffer from scalability issues, limited generalization, and costly worst-case inference, our framework exploits Brenier’s theorem to characterize the least favorable distribution as the pushforward of a transport map from a continuous reference measure. Based on the min-max formulation, we propose a Gradient Descent Ascent (GDA)-type scheme that updates the decision model and the transport map alternately, establishing global convergence guarantees without requiring convexity-concavity type assumptions. We also propose to parameterize the transport map using a neural network that can be trained simultaneously with the GDA iterations by matching the transported training samples, thereby achieving a simulation-free approach. The efficiency of the proposed method as a worst-case generator is validated by numerical experiments on synthetic and image data.