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We consider the problem of learning the optimal action-value function in the discounted-reward Markov decision processes (MDPs). We prove a new PAC bound on the sample-complexity of model-based value iteration algorithm in the presence of…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2012-07-03 Mohammad Gheshlaghi Azar , Remi Munos , Bert Kappen

We consider the problem of learning-based man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks in cyber-physical systems (CPS), and extend our previously proposed Bellman Deviation Detection (BDD) framework for model-free reinforcement learning (RL). We refine…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2026-04-02 Rishi Rani , Massimo Franceschetti

Sample-efficient offline reinforcement learning (RL) with linear function approximation has recently been studied extensively. Much of prior work has yielded the minimax-optimal bound of $\tilde{\mathcal{O}}(\frac{1}{\sqrt{K}})$, with $K$…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-01-30 Thanh Nguyen-Tang , Ming Yin , Sunil Gupta , Svetha Venkatesh , Raman Arora

This paper studies reward-agnostic exploration in reinforcement learning (RL) -- a scenario where the learner is unware of the reward functions during the exploration stage -- and designs an algorithm that improves over the state of the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-05-24 Gen Li , Yuling Yan , Yuxin Chen , Jianqing Fan

We present an optimistic Q-learning algorithm for regret minimization in average reward reinforcement learning under an additional assumption on the underlying MDP that for all policies, the time to visit some frequent state $s_0$ is finite…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-06-17 Priyank Agrawal , Shipra Agrawal

We study a new class of MDPs that employs multinomial logit (MNL) function approximation to ensure valid probability distributions over the state space. Despite its significant benefits, incorporating the non-linear function raises…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-01-17 Long-Fei Li , Yu-Jie Zhang , Peng Zhao , Zhi-Hua Zhou

The classical theory of reinforcement learning (RL) has focused on tabular and linear representations of value functions. Further progress hinges on combining RL with modern function approximators such as kernel functions and deep neural…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-01-01 Zhuoran Yang , Chi Jin , Zhaoran Wang , Mengdi Wang , Michael I. Jordan

Reinforcement learning in cooperative multi-agent settings has recently advanced significantly in its scope, with applications in cooperative estimation for advertising, dynamic treatment regimes, distributed control, and federated…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-03-30 Abhimanyu Dubey , Alex Pentland

A tenet of reinforcement learning is that the agent always observes rewards. However, this is not true in many realistic settings, e.g., a human observer may not always be available to provide rewards, sensors may be limited or…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-03-24 Alireza Kazemipour , Simone Parisi , Matthew E. Taylor , Michael Bowling

We consider the problem of reinforcement learning using function approximation, where the approximating basis can change dynamically while interacting with the environment. A motivation for such an approach is maximizing the value function…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2010-05-04 Dotan Di Castro , Shie Mannor

The constrained Markov decision process (CMDP) framework emerges as an important reinforcement learning approach for imposing safety or other critical objectives while maximizing cumulative reward. However, the current understanding of how…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-12-11 Tian Tian , Lin F. Yang , Csaba Szepesvári

We initiate the study of dynamic regret minimization for goal-oriented reinforcement learning modeled by a non-stationary stochastic shortest path problem with changing cost and transition functions. We start by establishing a lower bound…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-05-27 Liyu Chen , Haipeng Luo

We consider an online learning problem where the learner interacts with a Markov decision process in a sequence of episodes, where the reward function is allowed to change between episodes in an adversarial manner and the learner only gets…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-06-15 Gergely Neu , Julia Olkhovskaya

This work studies discrete-time discounted Markov decision processes with continuous state and action spaces and addresses the inverse problem of inferring a cost function from observed optimal behavior. We first consider the case in which…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-05-27 Angeliki Kamoutsi , Peter Schmitt-Förster , Tobias Sutter , Volkan Cevher , John Lygeros

We introduce the "inverse bandit" problem of estimating the rewards of a multi-armed bandit instance from observing the learning process of a low-regret demonstrator. Existing approaches to the related problem of inverse reinforcement…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2022-02-23 Wenshuo Guo , Kumar Krishna Agrawal , Aditya Grover , Vidya Muthukumar , Ashwin Pananjady

We study reinforcement learning (RL) with linear function approximation under the adaptivity constraint. We consider two popular limited adaptivity models: the batch learning model and the rare policy switch model, and propose two efficient…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-01-04 Tianhao Wang , Dongruo Zhou , Quanquan Gu

We consider the regret minimization problem in reinforcement learning (RL) in the episodic setting. In many real-world RL environments, the state and action spaces are continuous or very large. Existing approaches establish regret…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-06-29 Sayak Ray Chowdhury , Rafael Oliveira

Within the framework of probably approximately correct Markov decision processes (PAC-MDP), much theoretical work has focused on methods to attain near optimality after a relatively long period of learning and exploration. However,…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2016-04-06 Kenji Kawaguchi

This paper develops an inverse reinforcement learning algorithm aimed at recovering a reward function from the observed actions of an agent. We introduce a strategy to flexibly handle different types of actions with two approximations of…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2017-07-26 Kun Li , Yanan Sui , Joel W. Burdick

We study whether a risk-sensitive objective from asset-pricing theory -- recursive utility -- improves reinforcement learning for portfolio allocation. The Bellman equation under recursive utility involves a certainty equivalent (CE) of…

General Finance · Quantitative Finance 2026-03-25 Minkey Chang