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Standard Markov decision process (MDP) and reinforcement learning algorithms optimize the policy with respect to the expected gain. We propose an algorithm which enables to optimize an alternative objective: the probability that the gain is…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-03-06 Vincent Corlay , Jean-Christophe Sibel

Markov decision processes (MDPs) are used to model a wide variety of applications ranging from game playing over robotics to finance. Their optimal policy typically maximizes the expected sum of rewards given at each step of the decision…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-05-26 Maximilian Nägele , Jan Olle , Thomas Fösel , Remmy Zen , Florian Marquardt

Policy iteration and value iteration are at the core of many (approximate) dynamic programming methods. For Markov Decision Processes with finite state and action spaces, we show that they are instances of semismooth Newton-type methods to…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2022-06-28 Matilde Gargiani , Andrea Zanelli , Dominic Liao-McPherson , Tyler Summers , John Lygeros

In this paper, we consider the gradual-impulse control problem of continuous-time Markov decision processes, where the system performance is measured by the expectation of the exponential utility of the total cost. We prove, under very…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2023-11-16 Xin Guo , Aiko Kurushima , Alexey Piunovskiy , Yi Zhang

Markov decision processes are typically used for sequential decision making under uncertainty. For many aspects however, ranging from constrained or safe specifications to various kinds of temporal (non-Markovian) dependencies in task and…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2021-11-10 Nicky Lenaers , Martijn van Otterlo

Much recent research in decision theoretic planning has adopted Markov decision processes (MDPs) as the model of choice, and has attempted to make their solution more tractable by exploiting problem structure. One particular algorithm,…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2013-02-08 Craig Boutilier

In this paper, we propose a new policy iteration algorithm to compute the value function and the optimal controls of continuous time stochastic control problems. The algorithm relies on successive approximations using linear-quadratic…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-09-09 Dylan Possamaï , Ludovic Tangpi

This paper discusses algorithms for solving Markov decision processes (MDPs) that have monotone optimal policies. We propose a two-stage alternating convex optimization scheme that can accelerate the search for an optimal policy by…

Systems and Control · Computer Science 2017-04-04 Robert Mattila , Cristian R. Rojas , Vikram Krishnamurthy , Bo Wahlberg

Value Iteration is a widely used algorithm for solving Markov Decision Processes (MDPs). While previous studies have extensively analyzed its convergence properties, they primarily focus on convergence with respect to the infinity norm. In…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-02-06 Arsenii Mustafin , Sebastien Colla , Alex Olshevsky , Ioannis Ch. Paschalidis

The problem of constrained Markov decision process is considered. An agent aims to maximize the expected accumulated discounted reward subject to multiple constraints on its costs (the number of constraints is relatively small). A new dual…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2022-10-21 Egor Gladin , Maksim Lavrik-Karmazin , Karina Zainullina , Varvara Rudenko , Alexander Gasnikov , Martin Takáč

Markov decision problems (MDPs) provide the foundations for a number of problems of interest to AI researchers studying automated planning and reinforcement learning. In this paper, we summarize results regarding the complexity of solving…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2013-02-21 Michael L. Littman , Thomas L. Dean , Leslie Pack Kaelbling

Individuals are often faced with temptations that can lead them astray from long-term goals. We're interested in developing interventions that steer individuals toward making good initial decisions and then maintaining those decisions over…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-03-15 Shruthi Sukumar , Adrian F. Ward , Camden Elliott-Williams , Shabnam Hakimi , Michael C. Mozer

We consider the problem of computing optimal policies in average-reward Markov decision processes. This classical problem can be formulated as a linear program directly amenable to saddle-point optimization methods, albeit with a number of…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2020-01-13 Joan Bas-Serrano , Gergely Neu

Markov decision processes (MDPs) are used to model stochastic systems in many applications. Several efficient algorithms to compute optimal policies have been studied in the literature, including value iteration (VI) and policy iteration.…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2021-08-30 Vineet Goyal , Julien Grand-Clement

Model checking undiscounted reachability and expected-reward properties on Markov decision processes (MDPs) is key for the verification of systems that act under uncertainty. Popular algorithms are policy iteration and variants of value…

Logic in Computer Science · Computer Science 2023-01-25 Arnd Hartmanns , Sebastian Junges , Tim Quatmann , Maximilian Weininger

We consider deterministic Markov decision processes (MDPs) and apply max-plus algebra tools to approximate the value iteration algorithm by a smaller-dimensional iteration based on a representation on dictionaries of value functions. The…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-06-21 Francis Bach

Dynamic programming is a class of algorithms used to compute optimal control policies for Markov decision processes. Dynamic programming is ubiquitous in control theory, and is also the foundation of reinforcement learning. In this paper,…

Category Theory · Mathematics 2023-08-01 Jules Hedges , Riu Rodríguez Sakamoto

Iterative methods are ubiquitous in large-scale scientific computing applications, and a number of approaches based on meta-learning have been recently proposed to accelerate them. However, a systematic study of these approaches and how…

Numerical Analysis · Mathematics 2023-01-31 Sohei Arisaka , Qianxiao Li

The goal of a traditional Markov decision process (MDP) is to maximize expected cumulative reward over a defined horizon (possibly infinite). In many applications, however, a decision maker may be interested in optimizing a specific…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2025-10-16 Xiaocheng Li , Huaiyang Zhong , Margaret L. Brandeau

Markov decision processes (MDPs) are a popular model for performance analysis and optimization of stochastic systems. The parameters of stochastic behavior of MDPs are estimates from empirical observations of a system; their values are not…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2017-10-26 Dimitri Scheftelowitsch , Peter Buchholz , Vahid Hashemi , Holger Hermanns