Related papers: Statistical Efficiency of Thompson Sampling for Co…

We propose a novel combinatorial stochastic-greedy bandit (SGB) algorithm for combinatorial multi-armed bandit problems when no extra information other than the joint reward of the selected set of $n$ arms at each time step $t\in [T]$ is…

The combinatorial stochastic semi-bandit problem is an extension of the classical multi-armed bandit problem in which an algorithm pulls more than one arm at each stage and the rewards of all pulled arms are revealed. One difference with…

We study a type of Multi-Armed Bandit (MAB) problems in which arms with a Gaussian reward feedback are clustered. Such an arm setting finds applications in many real-world problems, for example, mmWave communications and portfolio…

In this paper, we introduce and analyze a variant of the Thompson sampling (TS) algorithm for contextual bandits. At each round, traditional TS requires samples from the current posterior distribution, which is usually intractable. To…

We study the stochastic Multi-Armed Bandit (MAB) problem under worst-case regret and heavy-tailed reward distribution. We modify the minimax policy MOSS for the sub-Gaussian reward distribution by using saturated empirical mean to design a…

We consider a continuous-time multi-arm bandit problem (CTMAB), where the learner can sample arms any number of times in a given interval and obtain a random reward from each sample, however, increasing the frequency of sampling incurs an…

The multi-armed bandit problem is a popular model for studying exploration/exploitation trade-off in sequential decision problems. Many algorithms are now available for this well-studied problem. One of the earliest algorithms, given by W.…

We consider the combinatorial bandits problem with semi-bandit feedback under finite sampling budget constraints, in which the learner can carry out its action only for a limited number of times specified by an overall budget. The action is…

We consider online sequential decision problems where an agent must balance exploration and exploitation. We derive a set of Bayesian `optimistic' policies which, in the stochastic multi-armed bandit case, includes the Thompson sampling…

Thompson sampling (TS) has optimal regret and excellent empirical performance in multi-armed bandit problems. Yet, in Bayesian optimization, TS underperforms popular acquisition functions (e.g., EI, UCB). TS samples arms according to the…

We consider a finite-horizon multi-armed bandit (MAB) problem in a Bayesian setting, for which we propose an information relaxation sampling framework. With this framework, we define an intuitive family of control policies that include…

In this paper, we provide the first investigation into adaptive combinatorial experimental design, focusing on the trade-off between regret minimization and statistical power in combinatorial multi-armed bandits (CMAB). While minimizing…

Games with large branching factors pose a significant challenge for game tree search algorithms. In this paper, we address this problem with a sampling strategy for Monte Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) algorithms called {\em na\"{i}ve sampling},…

Inspired by the Reward-Biased Maximum Likelihood Estimate method of adaptive control, we propose RBMLE -- a novel family of learning algorithms for stochastic multi-armed bandits (SMABs). For a broad range of SMABs including both the…

Top-k Combinatorial Bandits generalize multi-armed bandits, where at each round any subset of $k$ out of $n$ arms may be chosen and the sum of the rewards is gained. We address the full-bandit feedback, in which the agent observes only the…

Existing risk-aware multi-armed bandit models typically focus on risk measures of individual options such as variance. As a result, they cannot be directly applied to important real-world online decision making problems with correlated…

Monte-Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) typically uses multi-armed bandit (MAB) strategies designed to minimize cumulative regret, such as UCB1, as its selection strategy. However, in the root node of the search tree, it is more sensible to minimize…

This paper is about index policies for minimizing (frequentist) regret in a stochastic multi-armed bandit model, inspired by a Bayesian view on the problem. Our main contribution is to prove that the Bayes-UCB algorithm, which relies on…

In this paper we propose the first multi-armed bandit algorithm based on re-sampling that achieves asymptotically optimal regret simultaneously for different families of arms (namely Bernoulli, Gaussian and Poisson distributions). Unlike…

The multi-armed bandit (MAB) model is one of the most classical models to study decision-making in an uncertain environment. In this model, a player chooses one of $K$ possible arms of a bandit machine to play at each time step, where the…