Related papers: Efficiently Solving MDPs with Stochastic Mirror De…

We study a new two-time-scale stochastic gradient method for solving optimization problems, where the gradients are computed with the aid of an auxiliary variable under samples generated by time-varying MDPs controlled by the underlying…

We study the problem of computing an optimal policy of an infinite-horizon discounted constrained Markov decision process (constrained MDP). Despite the popularity of Lagrangian-based policy search methods used in practice, the oscillation…

We study the sample complexity of the plug-in approach for learning $\varepsilon$-optimal policies in average-reward Markov decision processes (MDPs) with a generative model. The plug-in approach constructs a model estimate then computes an…

We develop several provably efficient model-free reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms for infinite-horizon average-reward Markov Decision Processes (MDPs). We consider both online setting and the setting with access to a simulator. 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…

In this paper, we consider an integrated MSP-MDP framework which captures features of Markov decision process (MDP) and multistage stochastic programming (MSP). The integrated framework allows one to study a dynamic decision-making process…

Consider the problem of approximating the optimal policy of a Markov decision process (MDP) by sampling state transitions. In contrast to existing reinforcement learning methods that are based on successive approximations to the nonlinear…

This paper investigates two accelerated primal-dual mirror dynamical approaches for smooth and nonsmooth convex optimization problems with affine and closed, convex set constraints. In the smooth case, an accelerated primal-dual mirror…

Mirror descent (MD) is a powerful first-order optimization technique that subsumes several optimization algorithms including gradient descent (GD). In this work, we develop a semi-definite programming (SDP) framework to analyze the…

We present a method for solving implicit (factored) Markov decision processes (MDPs) with very large state spaces. We introduce a property of state space partitions which we call epsilon-homogeneity. Intuitively, an epsilon-homogeneous…

Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) are a mathematical framework for modeling sequential decision making under uncertainty. The classical approaches for solving MDPs are well known and have been widely studied, some of which rely on…

This work considers the sample complexity of obtaining an $\varepsilon$-optimal policy in an average reward Markov Decision Process (AMDP), given access to a generative model (simulator). When the ground-truth MDP is weakly communicating,…

We present new policy mirror descent (PMD) methods for solving reinforcement learning (RL) problems with either strongly convex or general convex regularizers. By exploring the structural properties of these overall highly nonconvex…

The problem of constrained Markov decision process (CMDP) is investigated, where an agent aims to maximize the expected accumulated discounted reward subject to multiple constraints on its utilities/costs. A new primal-dual approach is…

In this paper, we consider a class of continuous-time, continuous-space stochastic optimal control problems. Building upon recent advances in Markov chain approximation methods and sampling-based algorithms for deterministic path planning,…

We study the $(\varepsilon, \delta)$-PAC policy identification problem in finite-horizon episodic Markov Decision Processes. Existing approaches provide finite-time guarantees for approximate settings ($\varepsilon>0$) but suffer from high…

Model-free reinforcement learning is known to be memory and computation efficient and more amendable to large scale problems. In this paper, two model-free algorithms are introduced for learning infinite-horizon average-reward Markov…

Algorithms developed under stationary Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) often face challenges in non-stationary environments, and infinite-horizon formulations may not directly apply to finite-horizon tasks. To address these limitations, we…

We develop several new algorithms for learning Markov Decision Processes in an infinite-horizon average-reward setting with linear function approximation. Using the optimism principle and assuming that the MDP has a linear structure, we…

We study robust Markov decision processes (RMDPs) with general policy parameterization under s-rectangular and non-rectangular uncertainty sets. Prior work is largely limited to tabular policies, and hence either lacks sample complexity…