Related papers: Concentration bounds for SSP Q-learning for averag…
We show subexponential lower bounds (i.e., $2^{\Omega (n^c)}$) on the smoothed complexity of the classical Howard's Policy Iteration algorithm for Markov Decision Processes. The bounds hold for the total reward and the average reward…
We consider a finite number of $N$ statistically equal agents, each moving on a finite set of states according to a continuous-time Markov Decision Process (MDP). Transition intensities of the agents and generated rewards depend not only on…
We derive new concentration bounds for time averages of measurement outcomes in quantum Markov processes. This generalizes well-known bounds for classical Markov chains which provide constraints on finite time fluctuations of time-additive…
In many practical sequential decision-making problems, tracking the state of the environment incurs a sensing/communication/computation cost. In these settings, the agent's interaction with its environment includes the additional component…
We take initial steps in studying PAC-MDP algorithms with limited adaptivity, that is, algorithms that change its exploration policy as infrequently as possible during regret minimization. This is motivated by the difficulty of running…
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…
The Adversarial Markov Decision Process (AMDP) is a learning framework that deals with unknown and varying tasks in decision-making applications like robotics and recommendation systems. A major limitation of the AMDP formalism, however, is…
We present an efficient reinforcement learning algorithm that learns the optimal admission control policy in a partially observable queueing network. Specifically, only the arrival and departure times from the network are observable, and…
We present a general framework for applying machine-learning algorithms to the verification of Markov decision processes (MDPs). The primary goal of these techniques is to improve performance by avoiding an exhaustive exploration of the…
We are interested in risk constraints for infinite horizon discrete time Markov decision processes (MDPs). Starting with average reward MDPs, we show that increasing concave stochastic dominance constraints on the empirical distribution of…
We study computational and statistical aspects of learning Latent Markov Decision Processes (LMDPs). In this model, the learner interacts with an MDP drawn at the beginning of each epoch from an unknown mixture of MDPs. To sidestep known…
We study the model-based undiscounted reinforcement learning for partially observable Markov decision processes (POMDPs). The oracle we consider is the optimal policy of the POMDP with a known environment in terms of the average reward over…
We consider Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) with deterministic transitions and study the problem of regret minimization, which is central to the analysis and design of optimal learning algorithms. We present logarithmic problem-specific…
This paper investigates the potential of quantum acceleration in addressing infinite horizon Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) to enhance average reward outcomes. We introduce an innovative quantum framework for the agent's engagement with…
In this paper, we use concepts from supervisory control theory of discrete event systems to propose a method to learn optimal control policies for a finite-state Markov Decision Process (MDP) in which (only) certain sequences of actions are…
While there is an extensive body of research on the analysis of Value Iteration (VI) for discounted cumulative-reward MDPs, prior work on analyzing VI for (undiscounted) average-reward MDPs has been limited, and most prior results focus on…
We consider partially observable Markov decision processes (POMDPs) with a set of target states and positive integer costs associated with every transition. The traditional optimization objective (stochastic shortest path) asks to minimize…
We study countably infinite Markov decision processes (MDPs) with real-valued transition rewards. Every infinite run induces the following sequences of payoffs: 1. Point payoff (the sequence of directly seen transition rewards), 2. Mean…
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,…
Attention control is a key cognitive ability for humans to select information relevant to the current task. This paper develops a computational model of attention and an algorithm for attention-based probabilistic planning in Markov…