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Risk-averse total-reward Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) offer a promising framework for modeling and solving undiscounted infinite-horizon objectives. Existing model-based algorithms for risk measures like the entropic risk measure (ERM)…
In this paper, we model nested polar code construction as a Markov decision process (MDP), and tackle it with advanced reinforcement learning (RL) techniques. First, an MDP environment with state, action, and reward is defined in the…
Value iteration is a well-known method of solving Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) that is simple to implement and boasts strong theoretical convergence guarantees. However, the computational cost of value iteration quickly becomes…
Learning a Markov Decision Process (MDP) from a fixed batch of trajectories is a non-trivial task whose outcome's quality depends on both the amount and the diversity of the sampled regions of the state-action space. Yet, many MDPs are…
Markov decision processes (MDPs) are standard models for probabilistic systems with non-deterministic behaviours. Mean payoff (or long-run average reward) provides a mathematically elegant formalism to express performance related…
Markov reward processes (MRPs) are used to model stochastic phenomena arising in operations research, control engineering, robotics, and artificial intelligence, as well as communication and transportation networks. In many of these cases,…
We consider the problem of finding optimal policies for a Markov Decision Process with almost sure constraints on state transitions and action triplets. We define value and action-value functions that satisfy a barrier-based decomposition…
Reinforcement learning methods carry a well known bias-variance trade-off in n-step algorithms for optimal control. Unfortunately, this has rarely been addressed in current research. This trade-off principle holds independent of the choice…
This paper investigates the optimization problem of an infinite stage discrete time Markov decision process (MDP) with a long-run average metric considering both mean and variance of rewards together. Such performance metric is important…
This paper presents an interpretable reward design framework for reinforcement learning based constrained optimal control problems with state and terminal constraints. The problem is formalized within a standard partially observable Markov…
The selection of a reward function in Reinforcement Learning (RL) has garnered significant attention because of its impact on system performance. Issues of significant steady-state errors often manifest when quadratic reward functions are…
In reinforcement learning (RL), an agent learns to perform a task by interacting with an environment and receiving feedback (a numerical reward) for its actions. However, the assumption that rewards are always observable is often not…
Robust Markov decision processes (RMDPs) extend standard Markov decision processes (MDPs) to account for uncertainty in the transition probabilities. RMDPs have an uncertainty set that defines a set of possible transition functions, each of…
This paper presents a state representation framework for Markov decision processes (MDPs) that can be learned solely from state trajectories, requiring neither reward signals nor the actions executed by the agent. We propose learning the…
Multi-agent reinforcement learning involves multiple agents interacting with each other and a shared environment to complete tasks. When rewards provided by the environment are sparse, agents may not receive immediate feedback on the…
In this paper, we consider the problem of optimization and learning for constrained and multi-objective Markov decision processes, for both discounted rewards and expected average rewards. We formulate the problems as zero-sum games where…
In constrained reinforcement learning (RL), a learning agent seeks to not only optimize the overall reward but also satisfy the additional safety, diversity, or budget constraints. Consequently, existing constrained RL solutions require…
We study discrete-time discounted constrained Markov decision processes (CMDPs) on Borel spaces with unbounded reward functions. In our approach the transition probability functions are weakly or set-wise continuous. The reward functions…
Decision-making under distribution shift is a central challenge in reinforcement learning (RL), where training and deployment environments differ. We study this problem through the lens of robust Markov decision processes (RMDPs), which…
We study how a central bank should dynamically set short-term nominal interest rates to stabilize inflation and unemployment when macroeconomic relationships are uncertain and time-varying. We model monetary policy as a sequential…