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We consider the problem of designing policies for Markov decision processes (MDPs) with dynamic coherent risk objectives and constraints. We begin by formulating the problem in a Lagrangian framework. Under the assumption that the risk…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2021-03-30 Mohamadreza Ahmadi , Ugo Rosolia , Michel D. Ingham , Richard M. Murray , Aaron D. Ames

In domains such as finance, healthcare, and robotics, managing worst-case scenarios is critical, as failure to do so can lead to catastrophic outcomes. Distributional Reinforcement Learning (DRL) provides a natural framework to incorporate…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-02-13 Mehrdad Moghimi , Hyejin Ku

Many real-world domains require safe decision making in uncertain environments. In this work, we introduce a deep reinforcement learning framework for approaching this important problem. We consider a distribution over transition models,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-10-27 James Queeney , Mouhacine Benosman

Recursion is the fundamental paradigm to finitely describe potentially infinite objects. As state-of-the-art reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms cannot directly reason about recursion, they must rely on the practitioner's ingenuity in…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-06-24 Ernst Moritz Hahn , Mateo Perez , Sven Schewe , Fabio Somenzi , Ashutosh Trivedi , Dominik Wojtczak

Robust reinforcement learning (RL) aims to find a policy that optimizes the worst-case performance in the face of uncertainties. In this paper, we focus on action robust RL with the probabilistic policy execution uncertainty, in which,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-07-21 Guanlin Liu , Zhihan Zhou , Han Liu , Lifeng Lai

We present a model-free reinforcement learning algorithm to find an optimal policy for a finite-horizon Markov decision process while guaranteeing a desired lower bound on the probability of satisfying a signal temporal logic (STL)…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2021-09-29 Krishna C. Kalagarla , Rahul Jain , Pierluigi Nuzzo

Standard reinforcement learning (RL) optimizes policies for reward but imposes few constraints on how decisions evolve over time. As a result, policies may achieve high performance while exhibiting temporally incoherent behavior such as…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-04-24 Sukesh Subaharan

One major obstacle that precludes the success of reinforcement learning in real-world applications is the lack of robustness, either to model uncertainties or external disturbances, of the trained policies. Robustness is critical when the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-05-05 Rahul Singh , Qinsheng Zhang , Yongxin Chen

In finance, sequential decision problems are often faced, for which reinforcement learning (RL) emerges as a promising tool for optimisation without the need of analytical tractability. However, the objective of classical RL is the expected…

Computational Finance · Quantitative Finance 2026-02-13 Federico Cacciamani , Roberto Daluiso , Marco Pinciroli , Michele Trapletti , Edoardo Vittori

Markov decision processes (MDPs) are used to model a wide variety of applications ranging from game playing over robotics to finance. Their optimal policy typically maximizes the expected sum of rewards given at each step of the decision…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-05-26 Maximilian Nägele , Jan Olle , Thomas Fösel , Remmy Zen , Florian Marquardt

We consider the stochastic shortest path planning problem in MDPs, i.e., the problem of designing policies that ensure reaching a goal state from a given initial state with minimum accrued cost. In order to account for rare but important…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2021-03-30 Mohamadreza Ahmadi , Anushri Dixit , Joel W. Burdick , Aaron D. Ames

Robust Markov Decision Processes (RMDPs) intend to ensure robustness with respect to changing or adversarial system behavior. In this framework, transitions are modeled as arbitrary elements of a known and properly structured uncertainty…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-07-25 Esther Derman , Daniel Mankowitz , Timothy Mann , Shie Mannor

This work pioneers regret analysis of risk-sensitive reinforcement learning in partially observable environments with hindsight observation, addressing a gap in theoretical exploration. We introduce a novel formulation that integrates…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-02-29 Tonghe Zhang , Yu Chen , Longbo Huang

In inverse reinforcement learning (IRL), a learning agent infers a reward function encoding the underlying task using demonstrations from experts. However, many existing IRL techniques make the often unrealistic assumption that the agent…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-01-04 Franck Djeumou , Christian Ellis , Murat Cubuktepe , Craig Lennon , Ufuk Topcu

Most reinforcement learning (RL) approaches for the decision-making of autonomous driving consider safety as a reward instead of a cost, which makes it hard to balance the tradeoff between safety and other objectives. Human risk preference…

Robotics · Computer Science 2025-03-05 Yang Li , Shijie Yuan , Yuan Chang , Xiaolong Chen , Qisong Yang , Zhiyuan Yang , Hongmao Qin

In this paper we present a framework for risk-averse model predictive control (MPC) of linear systems affected by multiplicative uncertainty. Our key innovation is to consider time-consistent, dynamic risk metrics as objective functions to…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2015-11-24 Yin-Lam Chow , Marco Pavone

Reinforcement Learning (RL) remains a central optimisation framework in machine learning. Although RL agents can converge to optimal solutions, the definition of ``optimality'' depends on the environment's statistical properties. The…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-01-14 Bert Verbruggen , Arne Vanhoyweghen , Vincent Ginis

Shifting from traditional control strategies to Deep Reinforcement Learning (RL) for legged robots poses inherent challenges, especially when addressing real-world physical constraints during training. While high-fidelity simulations…

Robotics · Computer Science 2023-09-28 Joonho Lee , Lukas Schroth , Victor Klemm , Marko Bjelonic , Alexander Reske , Marco Hutter

A Markov decision process can be parameterized by a transition kernel and a reward function. Both play essential roles in the study of reinforcement learning as evidenced by their presence in the Bellman equations. In our inquiry of various…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-09-04 Falcon Z. Dai

Designing sample-efficient and computationally feasible reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms is particularly challenging in environments with large or infinite state and action spaces. In this paper, we advance this effort by presenting…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-10-04 Zakaria Mhammedi