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As a paradigm for sequential decision making in unknown environments, reinforcement learning (RL) has received a flurry of attention in recent years. However, the explosion of model complexity in emerging applications and the presence of…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2025-07-22 Yuejie Chi , Yuxin Chen , Yuting Wei

Inverse reinforcement learning (IRL) is the problem of finding a reward function that generates a given optimal policy for a given Markov Decision Process. This paper looks at an algorithmic-independent geometric analysis of the IRL problem…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-02-19 Abi Komanduru , Jean Honorio

We study computationally and statistically efficient Reinforcement Learning algorithms for the linear Bellman Complete setting. This setting uses linear function approximation to capture value functions and unifies existing models like…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-03-04 Runzhe Wu , Ayush Sekhari , Akshay Krishnamurthy , Wen Sun

We study the safe reinforcement learning problem with nonlinear function approximation, where policy optimization is formulated as a constrained optimization problem with both the objective and the constraint being nonconvex functions. For…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-10-29 Ming Yu , Zhuoran Yang , Mladen Kolar , Zhaoran Wang

We develop a continuous-time reinforcement learning framework for a class of singular stochastic control problems without entropy regularization. The optimal singular control is characterized as the optimal singular control law, which is a…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2026-05-14 Zongxia Liang , Xiaodong Luo , Xiang Yu

Reinforcement learning is able to solve complex sequential decision-making tasks but is currently limited by sample efficiency and required computation. To improve sample efficiency, recent work focuses on model-based RL which interleaves…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-06-19 Yi Zhao , Wenshuai Zhao , Rinu Boney , Juho Kannala , Joni Pajarinen

We deal with the convergence of the value function of an approximate control problem with uncertain dynamics to the value function of a nonlinear optimal control problem. The assumptions on the dynamics and the costs are rather general and…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2021-05-31 Andrea Pesare , Michele Palladino , Maurizio Falcone

In complex environments with large discrete action spaces, effective decision-making is critical in reinforcement learning (RL). Despite the widespread use of value-based RL approaches like Q-learning, they come with a computational burden,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-05-17 Fares Fourati , Vaneet Aggarwal , Mohamed-Slim Alouini

Reinforcement Learning (RL) has achieved state-of-the-art results in domains such as robotics and games. We build on this previous work by applying RL algorithms to a selection of canonical online stochastic optimization problems with a…

There has recently been an increased interest in reinforcement learning for nonlinear control problems. However standard reinforcement learning algorithms can often struggle even on seemingly simple set-point control problems. This paper…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2023-04-21 Ruoqi Zhang , Per Mattsson , Torbjörn Wigren

This paper studies the continuous-time reinforcement learning for stochastic singular control with the application to an infinite-horizon irreversible reinsurance problems. The singular control is equivalently characterized as a pair of…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2025-12-03 Zongxia Liang , Xiaodong Luo , Xiang Yu

It is well known that the extension of Watkins' algorithm to general function approximation settings is challenging: does the projected Bellman equation have a solution? If so, is the solution useful in the sense of generating a good…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2020-08-11 Prashant G. Mehta , Sean P. Meyn

While reinforcement learning (RL) has the potential to enable robots to autonomously acquire a wide range of skills, in practice, RL usually requires manual, per-task engineering of reward functions, especially in real world settings where…

Robotics · Computer Science 2019-02-15 Tianhe Yu , Gleb Shevchuk , Dorsa Sadigh , Chelsea Finn

We investigate an entropy-regularized reinforcement learning (RL) approach to optimal stopping problems motivated by real option models. Classical stopping rules are strict and non-randomized, limiting natural exploration in RL settings. To…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2026-02-18 Jodi Dianetti , Giorgio Ferrari , Renyuan Xu

Reinforcement learning is commonly used with function approximation. However, very few positive results are known about the convergence of function approximation based RL control algorithms. In this paper we show that TD(0) and Sarsa(0)…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2007-05-23 Istvan Szita , Andras Lorincz

In this work, we study model-based reinforcement learning (RL) in unknown stabilizable linear dynamical systems. When learning a dynamical system, one needs to stabilize the unknown dynamics in order to avoid system blow-ups. We propose an…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-06-06 Sahin Lale , Kamyar Azizzadenesheli , Babak Hassibi , Anima Anandkumar

Reward shaping has been applied widely to accelerate Reinforcement Learning (RL) agents' training. However, a principled way of designing effective reward shaping functions, especially for complex continuous control problems, remains…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-02-12 Mateo Juliani , Mingxuan Li , Elias Bareinboim

Autonomous agents must often deal with conflicting requirements, such as completing tasks using the least amount of time/energy, learning multiple tasks, or dealing with multiple opponents. In the context of reinforcement learning~(RL),…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-10-30 Santiago Paternain , Luiz F. O. Chamon , Miguel Calvo-Fullana , Alejandro Ribeiro

Reinforcement Learning (RL) of robotic manipulation skills, despite its impressive successes, stands to benefit from incorporating domain knowledge from control theory. One of the most important properties that is of interest is control…

Robotics · Computer Science 2021-03-03 Shahbaz Abdul Khader , Hang Yin , Pietro Falco , Danica Kragic

Designing optimal controllers continues to be challenging as systems are becoming complex and are inherently nonlinear. The principal advantage of reinforcement learning (RL) is its ability to learn from the interaction with the environment…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2018-10-05 Savinay Nagendra , Nikhil Podila , Rashmi Ugarakhod , Koshy George