Related papers: Optimal Coordinate as a General Method in Stochast…
The purpose of this paper is to review and highlight some connections between the problem of nonlinear smoothing and optimal control of the Liouville equation. The latter has been an active area of recent research interest owing to work in…
This study presents the extension of the data-driven optimal prediction approach to the dynamical system with control. The optimal prediction is used to analyze dynamical systems in which the states consist of resolved and unresolved…
In this paper we propose stochastic gradient-free methods and accelerated methods with momentum for solving stochastic optimization problems. All these methods rely on stochastic directions rather than stochastic gradients. We analyze the…
We present a method for optimal path planning of human walking paths in mountainous terrain, using a control theoretic formulation and a Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation. Previous models for human navigation were entirely deterministic,…
Stochastic gradient descent with momentum (SGDM) methods have become fundamental optimization tools in machine learning, combining the computational efficiency of stochastic gradients with the acceleration benefits of momentum. Despite…
Stochastic optimal control problems have a long tradition in applied probability, with the questions addressed being of high relevance in a multitude of fields. Even though theoretical solutions are well understood in many scenarios, their…
In this paper we explore the use of block coordinate descent (BCD) to optimize the centroidal momentum dynamics for dynamically consistent multi-contact behaviors. The centroidal dynamics have recently received a large amount of attention…
We study global optimization of non-convex functions through optimal control theory. Our main result establishes that (quasi-)optimal trajectories of a discounted control problem converge globally and practically asymptotically to the set…
We study the optimal transport problem for pairs of stationary finite-state Markov chains, with an emphasis on the computation of optimal transition couplings. Transition couplings are a constrained family of transport plans that capture…
Robotic locomotion often relies on sequenced gaits to efficiently convert control input into desired motion. Despite extensive studies on gait optimization, achieving smooth and efficient gait transitions remains challenging. In this paper,…
Viewing stochastic processes through the lens of occupation measures has proved to be a powerful angle of attack for the theoretical and computational analysis of stochastic optimal control problems. We present a simple modification of the…
The state-of-the-art methods for solving optimization problems in big dimensions are variants of randomized coordinate descent (RCD). In this paper we introduce a fundamentally new type of acceleration strategy for RCD based on the…
We consider stochastic approximation with block-coordinate stepsizes and propose adaptive stepsize rules that aim to minimize the expected distance from the next iterate to an (unknown) target point. These stepsize rules employ online…
Consider a polynomial optimisation problem, whose instances vary continuously over time. We propose to use a coordinate-descent algorithm for solving such time-varying optimisation problems. In particular, we focus on relaxations of…
In Stochastic Optimal Control (SOC) one minimizes the average cost-to-go, that consists of the cost-of-control (amount of efforts), cost-of-space (where one wants the system to be) and the target cost (where one wants the system to arrive),…
Following Demidovich's concept and definition of convergent systems, we analyze the optimal nonlinear damping control, recently proposed [1] for the second-order systems. Targeting the problem of output regulation, correspondingly tracking…
Many robotics tasks, such as path planning or trajectory optimization, are formulated as optimal control problems (OCPs). The key to obtaining high performance lies in the design of the OCP's objective function. In practice, the objective…
For many stochastic processes there is an underlying coordinate space, $V$, with the process moving from point to point in $V$ or on variables (such as spin configurations) defined with respect to $V$. There is a matrix of transition…
We study stochastic second-order methods for solving general non-convex optimization problems. We propose using a special version of momentum to stabilize the stochastic gradient and Hessian estimates in Newton's method. We show that…
Non-smooth dynamics driven by stochastic disturbance arise in a wide variety of engineering problems. Impulsive interventions are often employed to control stochastic systems; however, the modeling and analysis subject to execution delay…