Related papers: Is Q-Learning Minimax Optimal? A Tight Sample Comp…
Existing studies indicate that momentum ideas in conventional optimization can be used to improve the performance of Q-learning algorithms. However, the finite-sample analysis for momentum-based Q-learning algorithms is only available for…
Low-complexity models such as linear function representation play a pivotal role in enabling sample-efficient reinforcement learning (RL). The current paper pertains to a scenario with value-based linear representation, which postulates the…
A fundamental question in reinforcement learning is whether model-free algorithms are sample efficient. Recently, Jin et al. \cite{jin2018q} proposed a Q-learning algorithm with UCB exploration policy, and proved it has nearly optimal…
Q-learning is a stochastic approximation version of the classic value iteration. The literature has established that Q-learning suffers from both maximization bias and slower convergence. Recently, multi-step algorithms have shown practical…
Sample complexity bounds are a common performance metric in the Reinforcement Learning literature. In the discounted cost, infinite horizon setting, all of the known bounds have a factor that is a polynomial in $1/(1-\gamma)$, where $\gamma…
A fundamental question in the theory of reinforcement learning is: suppose the optimal $Q$-function lies in the linear span of a given $d$ dimensional feature mapping, is sample-efficient reinforcement learning (RL) possible? The recent and…
Reinforcement learning has witnessed significant advancements, particularly with the emergence of model-based approaches. Among these, $Q$-learning has proven to be a powerful algorithm in model-free settings. However, the extension of…
This paper is concerned with the sample efficiency of reinforcement learning, assuming access to a generative model (or simulator). We first consider $\gamma$-discounted infinite-horizon Markov decision processes (MDPs) with state space…
Q-learning with neural network function approximation (neural Q-learning for short) is among the most prevalent deep reinforcement learning algorithms. Despite its empirical success, the non-asymptotic convergence rate of neural Q-learning…
We consider the problem of federated Q-learning, where $M$ agents aim to collaboratively learn the optimal Q-function of an unknown infinite-horizon Markov decision process with finite state and action spaces. We investigate the trade-off…
Regularized Markov Decision Processes serve as models of sequential decision making under uncertainty wherein the decision maker has limited information processing capacity and/or aversion to model ambiguity. With functional approximation,…
The objective in this paper is to obtain fast converging reinforcement learning algorithms to approximate solutions to the problem of discounted cost optimal stopping in an irreducible, uniformly ergodic Markov chain, evolving on a compact…
We present the convergence rates of synchronous and asynchronous Q-learning for average-reward Markov decision processes, where the absence of contraction poses a fundamental challenge. Existing non-asymptotic results overcome this…
Deep Q-learning based algorithms have been applied successfully in many decision making problems, while their theoretical foundations are not as well understood. In this paper, we study a Fitted Q-Iteration with two-layer ReLU neural…
Various algorithms in reinforcement learning exhibit dramatic variability in their convergence rates and ultimate accuracy as a function of the problem structure. Such instance-specific behavior is not captured by existing global minimax…
This paper develops a novel control-theoretic framework to analyze the non-asymptotic convergence of Q-learning. We show that the dynamics of asynchronous Q-learning with a constant step-size can be naturally formulated as a discrete-time…
The current paper studies the problem of agnostic $Q$-learning with function approximation in deterministic systems where the optimal $Q$-function is approximable by a function in the class $\mathcal{F}$ with approximation error $\delta \ge…
We study the problem of estimating the optimal Q-function of $\gamma$-discounted Markov decision processes (MDPs) under the synchronous setting, where independent samples for all state-action pairs are drawn from a generative model at each…
Temporal-difference and Q-learning play a key role in deep reinforcement learning, where they are empowered by expressive nonlinear function approximators such as neural networks. At the core of their empirical successes is the learned…
In recent years there has been a collective research effort to find new formulations of reinforcement learning that are simultaneously more efficient and more amenable to analysis. This paper concerns one approach that builds on the linear…