Optimal transport theory has recently found many applications in machine learning thanks to its capacity for comparing various machine learning objects considered as distributions. The Kantorovitch formulation, leading to the Wasserstein distance, focuses on the features of the elements of the objects but treat them independently, whereas the Gromov-Wasserstein distance focuses only on the relations between the elements, depicting the structure of the object, yet discarding its features. In this paper we propose to extend these distances in order to encode simultaneously both the feature and structure informations, resulting in the Fused Gromov-Wasserstein distance. We develop the mathematical framework for this novel distance, prove its metric and interpolation properties and provide a concentration result for the convergence of finite samples. We also illustrate and interpret its use in various contexts where structured objects are involved.

本文提出了一种融合了特征和结构信息的新型距离度量，即融合Gromov-Wasserstein距离，它的数学框架被证明具有度量和插值属性，并提供收敛于有限样本的浓度结果。此外，我们还展示和解释了该方法在涉及结构化对象的各种情景中的应用。

结构化对象的融合Gromov-Wasserstein距离: 理论基础与数学性质