Related papers: The Concept of Criticality in Reinforcement Learni…
Traditional reinforcement learning (RL) assumes the agents make decisions based on Markov decision processes (MDPs) with one-step transition models. In many real-world applications, such as energy management and stock investment, agents can…
In the context of reinforcement learning we introduce the concept of criticality of a state, which indicates the extent to which the choice of action in that particular state influences the expected return. That is, a state in which the…
In this paper, we consider Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) with error states. Error states are those states entering which is undesirable or dangerous. We define the risk with respect to a policy as the probability of entering such a state…
Reinforcement learning (RL) agents have traditionally been tasked with maximizing the value function of a Markov decision process (MDP), either in continuous settings, with fixed discount factor $\gamma < 1$, or in episodic settings, with…
Batch reinforcement learning (RL) is important to apply RL algorithms to many high stakes tasks. Doing batch RL in a way that yields a reliable new policy in large domains is challenging: a new decision policy may visit states and actions…
Reinforcement Learning (RL) can model complex behavior policies for goal-directed sequential decision making tasks. A hallmark of RL algorithms is Temporal Difference (TD) learning: value function for the current state is moved towards a…
Reinforcement learning, mathematically described by Markov Decision Problems, may be approached either through dynamic programming or policy search. Actor-critic algorithms combine the merits of both approaches by alternating between steps…
A model among many may only be best under certain states of the world. Switching from a model to another can also be costly. Finding a procedure to dynamically choose a model in these circumstances requires to solve a complex estimation…
Reinforcement learning (RL), a common tool in decision making, learns control policies from various experiences based on the associated cumulative return/rewards without treating them differently. Humans, on the contrary, often learn to…
Reinforcement Learning (RL) has gained substantial attention across diverse application domains and theoretical investigations. Existing literature on RL theory largely focuses on risk-neutral settings where the decision-maker learns to…
This paper describes a purely data-driven solution to a class of sequential decision-making problems with a large number of concurrent online decisions, with applications to computing systems and operations research. We assume that while…
In most practical applications of reinforcement learning, it is untenable to maintain direct estimates for individual states; in continuous-state systems, it is impossible. Instead, researchers often leverage state similarity (whether…
General purpose intelligent learning agents cycle through (complex,non-MDP) sequences of observations, actions, and rewards. On the other hand, reinforcement learning is well-developed for small finite state Markov Decision Processes…
Despite the numerous advances, reinforcement learning remains away from widespread acceptance for autonomous controller design as compared to classical methods due to lack of ability to effectively tackle the reality gap. The reliance on…
Safe Reinforcement Learning (RL) plays an important role in applying RL algorithms to safety-critical real-world applications, addressing the trade-off between maximizing rewards and adhering to safety constraints. This work introduces a…
This paper targets the efficient construction of a safety shield for decision making in scenarios that incorporate uncertainty. Markov decision processes (MDPs) are prominent models to capture such planning problems. Reinforcement learning…
This study investigates the mean-variance (MV) trade-off in reinforcement learning (RL), an instance of the sequential decision-making under uncertainty. Our objective is to obtain MV-efficient policies whose means and variances are located…
As with any machine learning problem with limited data, effective offline RL algorithms require careful regularization to avoid overfitting. One-step methods perform regularization by doing just a single step of policy improvement, while…
From a first-principles perspective, it may seem odd that the strongest results in foundation model fine-tuning (FT) are achieved via a relatively complex, two-stage training procedure. Specifically, one first trains a reward model (RM) on…
Markov Decision Processes (MDPs), the mathematical framework underlying most algorithms in Reinforcement Learning (RL), are often used in a way that wrongfully assumes that the state of an agent's environment does not change during action…