Low-Rank Learning by Design: the Role of Network Architecture and
  Activation Linearity in Gradient Rank Collapse
Bradley T. Baker Barak A. Pearlmutter Robyn Miller Vince D. Calhoun Sergey M. Plis
Our understanding of learning dynamics of deep neural networks (DNNs) remains
incomplete. Recent research has begun to uncover the mathematical principles
underlying these networks, including the phenomenon of "Neural Collapse", where
linear classifiers within DNNs converge to specific geometrical structures
during late-stage training. However, the role of geometric constraints in
learning extends beyond this terminal phase. For instance, gradients in
fully-connected layers naturally develop a low-rank structure due to the
accumulation of rank-one outer products over a training batch. Despite the
attention given to methods that exploit this structure for memory saving or
regularization, the emergence of low-rank learning as an inherent aspect of
certain DNN architectures has been under-explored. In this paper, we conduct a
comprehensive study of gradient rank in DNNs, examining how architectural
choices and structure of the data effect gradient rank bounds. Our theoretical
analysis provides these bounds for training fully-connected, recurrent, and
convolutional neural networks. We also demonstrate, both theoretically and
empirically, how design choices like activation function linearity, bottleneck
layer introduction, convolutional stride, and sequence truncation influence
these bounds. Our findings not only contribute to the understanding of learning
dynamics in DNNs, but also provide practical guidance for deep learning
engineers to make informed design decisions.