Related papers: Sample and Communication-Efficient Decentralized A…
Decentralized optimization is critical for solving large-scale machine learning problems over distributed networks, where multiple nodes collaborate through local communication. In practice, the variances of stochastic gradient estimators…
We propose a finite-state, decentralized decision and control framework for multi-agent ground coverage. The approach decomposes the problem into two coupled components: (i) the structural design of a deep neural network (DNN) induced by…
Actor-critic methods have achieved significant success in many challenging applications. However, its finite-time convergence is still poorly understood in the most practical single-timescale form. Existing works on analyzing…
We propose a distributed algorithm, named Distributed Alternating Direction Method of Multipliers (D-ADMM), for solving separable optimization problems in networks of interconnected nodes or agents. In a separable optimization problem there…
Safety is essential for reinforcement learning (RL) applied in real-world situations. Chance constraints are suitable to represent the safety requirements in stochastic systems. Previous chance-constrained RL methods usually have a low…
Privacy preservation is addressed for decentralized optimization, where $N$ agents cooperatively minimize the sum of $N$ convex functions private to these individual agents. In most existing decentralized optimization approaches,…
This paper explores the application of the Soft Actor-Critic (SAC) algorithm within a Distributional Reinforcement Learning setting and introduces an implementation of such algorithm named Cram\'er-based Distributional Soft Actor-Critic…
We study a variation of vanilla stochastic gradient descent where the optimizer only has access to a Markovian sampling scheme. These schemes encompass applications that range from decentralized optimization with a random walker (token…
We analyze the effect of synchronization on distributed stochastic gradient algorithms. By exploiting an analogy with dynamical models of biological quorum sensing - where synchronization between agents is induced through communication with…
We consider the problem of \emph{fully decentralized} multi-agent reinforcement learning (MARL), where the agents are located at the nodes of a time-varying communication network. Specifically, we assume that the reward functions of the…
This thesis explores a particular class of distributed optimization methods for various separable resource allocation problems, which are of high interest in a wide array of multi-agent settings. A distinctly motivating application for this…
This paper focuses on decentralized composite optimization over networks without a central coordinator. We propose a novel decentralized symmetric ADMM algorithm that incorporates multiple communication rounds within each iteration, derived…
This paper addresses the problem of learning an equilibrium efficiently in general-sum Markov games through decentralized multi-agent reinforcement learning. Given the fundamental difficulty of calculating a Nash equilibrium (NE), we…
Making Smart Cities more sustainable, resilient and democratic is emerging as an endeavor of satisfying hard constraints, for instance meeting net-zero targets. Decentralized multi-agent methods for socio-technical optimization of…
Understanding and constructing brain communications that capture dynamic communications across multiple regions is fundamental to modern system neuroscience, yet current methods struggle to find time-varying region-level communications or…
We consider the problem of decentralized optimization in networks with communication delays. To accommodate delays, we need decentralized optimization algorithms that work on directed graphs. Existing approaches require nodes to know their…
Existing asynchronous distributed optimization algorithms often use diminishing step-sizes that cause slow practical convergence, or fixed step-sizes that depend on an assumed upper bound of delays. Not only is such a delay bound hard to…
Gradient-based optimization methods implemented on distributed computing architectures are increasingly used to tackle large-scale machine learning applications. A key bottleneck in such distributed systems is the high communication…
In this paper, sample-aware policy entropy regularization is proposed to enhance the conventional policy entropy regularization for better exploration. Exploiting the sample distribution obtainable from the replay buffer, the proposed…
Actor-critic (AC) algorithms, empowered by neural networks, have had significant empirical success in recent years. However, most of the existing theoretical support for AC algorithms focuses on the case of linear function approximations,…