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The multi-armed bandit problem is a core framework for sequential decision-making under uncertainty, but classical algorithms often fail in environments with hidden, time-varying states that confound reward estimation and optimal action…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-02-19 Jikai Jin , Kenneth Hung , Sanath Kumar Krishnamurthy , Baoyi Shi , Congshan Zhang

We study a grouped bandit setting where each arm comprises multiple independent sub-arms referred to as attributes. Each attribute of each arm has an independent stochastic reward. We impose the constraint that for an arm to be deemed…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-12-12 Sahil Dharod , Malyala Preethi Sravani , Sakshi Heda , Sharayu Moharir

We propose and study Collpasing Bandits, a new restless multi-armed bandit (RMAB) setting in which each arm follows a binary-state Markovian process with a special structure: when an arm is played, the state is fully observed, thus…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-07-10 Aditya Mate , Jackson A. Killian , Haifeng Xu , Andrew Perrault , Milind Tambe

The Whittle index, which characterizes optimal policies for controlling certain single restless bandit projects (a Markov decision process with two actions: active and passive) is the basis for a widely used heuristic index policy for the…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2021-05-06 José Niño-Mora

We consider a multi-armed bandit problem where the decision maker can explore and exploit different arms at every round. The exploited arm adds to the decision maker's cumulative reward (without necessarily observing the reward) while the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2012-07-03 Orly Avner , Shie Mannor , Ohad Shamir

We address the problem of identifying the optimal policy with a fixed confidence level in a multi-armed bandit setup, when \emph{the arms are subject to linear constraints}. Unlike the standard best-arm identification problem which is well…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-01-26 Emil Carlsson , Debabrota Basu , Fredrik D. Johansson , Devdatt Dubhashi

We consider the channel access problem in a multi-channel opportunistic communication system with imperfect channel sensing, where the state of each channel evolves as a non independent and identically distributed Markov process. This…

Systems and Control · Computer Science 2015-06-05 Kehao Wang , Lin Chen , Quan Liu , Khaldoun Al Agha

Restless Multi-Armed Bandits (RMABs) are powerful models for decision-making under uncertainty, yet classical formulations typically assume fixed dynamics, an assumption often violated in nonstationary environments. We introduce MARBLE…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-04-13 Mohsen Amiri , Konstantin Avrachenkov , Ibtihal El Mimouni , Sindri Magnússon

The Whittle index, which characterizes optimal policies for controlling certain single restless bandit projects (a Markov decision process with two actions: active and passive) is the basis for a widely used heuristic index policy for the…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2021-05-05 José Niño-Mora

In the multiarmed bandit problem a gambler chooses an arm of a slot machine to pull considering a tradeoff between exploration and exploitation. We study the stochastic bandit problem where each arm has a reward distribution supported in a…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2013-03-29 Junya Honda , Akimichi Takemura

We study the multi-armed bandit problem with arms which are Markov chains with rewards. In the finite-horizon setting, the celebrated Gittins indices do not apply, and the exact solution is intractable. We provide approximation algorithms…

Data Structures and Algorithms · Computer Science 2016-09-14 Will Ma

We consider the restless multi-armed bandit (RMAB) problem with unknown dynamics in which a player chooses M out of N arms to play at each time. The reward state of each arm transits according to an unknown Markovian rule when it is played…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2011-12-30 Haoyang Liu , Keqin Liu , Qing Zhao

A sensing policy for the restless multi-armed bandit problem with stationary but unknown reward distributions is proposed. The work is presented in the context of cognitive radios in which the bandit problem arises when deciding which parts…

Information Theory · Computer Science 2012-11-20 Jan Oksanen , Visa Koivunen , H. Vincent Poor

We consider the restless bandits with general state space under partial observability with two observational models: first, the state of each bandit is not observable at all, and second, the state of each bandit is observable only if it is…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2023-05-25 Nima Akbarzadeh , Aditya Mahajan

In this paper,we consider the restless bandit problem, which is one of the most well-studied generalizations of the celebrated stochastic multi-armed bandit problem in decision theory. However, it is known be PSPACE-Hard to approximate to…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2011-04-29 Quan Liu , Kehao Wang , Lin Chen

We consider a stochastic multi-armed bandit setting where reward must be actively queried for it to be observed. We provide tight lower and upper problem-dependent guarantees on both the regret and the number of queries. Interestingly, we…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-10-28 Nadav Merlis , Yonathan Efroni , Shie Mannor

We consider a class of restless multi-armed bandit problems (RMBP) that arises in dynamic multichannel access, user/server scheduling, and optimal activation in multi-agent systems. For this class of RMBP, we establish the indexability and…

Information Theory · Computer Science 2008-11-13 Keqin Liu , Qing Zhao

This paper examines multi-armed bandits in which actions are taken at random discrete times. The model consists of $J$ independent arms. When an arm is operated, it must remain active for a random duration, modeled by the inter-arrival time…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2026-03-05 Kei Noba , José Luis Pérez , Kazutoshi Yamazaki , Qingyuan Zhang

We consider the classical multi-armed bandit problem, but with strategic arms. In this context, each arm is characterized by a bounded support reward distribution and strategically aims to maximize its own utility by potentially retaining a…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-01-28 Ahmed Ben Yahmed , Clément Calauzènes , Vianney Perchet

We consider a policy gradient algorithm applied to a finite-arm bandit problem with Bernoulli rewards. We allow learning rates to depend on the current state of the algorithm, rather than use a deterministic time-decreasing learning rate.…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-09-24 Denis Denisov , Neil Walton