arXiv:2607.12334cs.CLcs.ET2026-07

用优化模型选证据,让问答更准且省大模型算力。

QUBO-Optimized Evidence Selection for Retrieval-Augmented Question Answering with Unconventional Solvers

  • 把证据选择建模为可解的组合优化问题,兼顾相关性与互补性。
  • 在HotpotQA上表现接近大模型,精确匹配率超70%。
  • 适合追求高效、可解释的多跳问答系统开发者使用。

检索增强问答依赖于选出能共同支持答案生成的证据段落。然而,多数RAG流程依赖于基于单个相关性得分的top-k排序,难以满足多跳问题对多个信息需求的互补性要求。近期基于大模型的选段方法虽将检索视为集合选择,但中间阶段调用大模型成本高且难扩展。本文将证据选择建模为无约束二次二值优化(QUBO)问题:给定问题、候选段落及分解后的信息需求,构建能量函数,权衡相关性、需求覆盖度、支持强度、冗余度、互补性和紧凑性。低能量解对应紧凑且覆盖需求的证据子集,避免冗余。所选段落再交由下游语言模型生成答案,实现组合式证据选择与语义生成分离。我们在HotpotQA上评估该方法,对比了基于大模型的集合选择器及非大模型基线(包括BM25、相关性top-k、最大边际相关性、混合词法-语义排序、贪心覆盖和随机选择)。结果表明,该QUBO选择器在精确匹配率和token-F1上均达到与大模型选择器相当的性能,同时提供兼容伊辛/ QUBO求解器的结构化选择框架。这表明多跳证据选择可转化为离散优化问题,为未来RAG系统开辟新路径:大模型仅用于语义处理与答案生成,而上下文选择由专用求解器完成。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Retrieval-augmented question answering depends on selecting evidence passages that jointly support answer generation. However, many RAG pipelines rely on top-\(k\) ranking, where passages are selected mainly by individual relevance scores, even though multi-hop questions often require complementary evidence satisfying multiple information requirements. Recent LLM-based selectors address this by treating retrieval as set selection, but using an LLM for this intermediate stage can be costly and difficult to scale. In this work, we formulate evidence selection as a Quadratic Unconstrained Binary Optimization (QUBO) problem. Given a question, candidate passages, and decomposed information requirements, our method constructs an energy function that balances relevance, requirement coverage, support strength, redundancy, complementarity, and compactness. Low-energy solutions correspond to compact evidence subsets that cover the needed requirements while avoiding unnecessary or repetitive context. The selected passages are then passed to a downstream language model for answer generation, separating combinatorial evidence selection from semantic answer generation. We evaluate the proposed QUBO selector on HotpotQA and compare it with LLM-based set selectors and non-LLM baselines including BM25, relevance top-\(k\), maximal marginal relevance, hybrid lexical--semantic ranking, greedy coverage, and random selection. The QUBO selector achieves competitive exact-match and token-F1 performance relative to LLM-based selectors while providing a solver-compatible formulation for structured evidence selection. These results suggest that multi-hop evidence selection can be cast as discrete optimization, opening a path toward RAG pipelines where LLMs are reserved for semantic processing and answer generation, while context selection is handled by Ising/QUBO-compatible solvers.

多跳问答组合优化RAG

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