Related papers: Monte Carlo Policy Gradient Method for Binary Opti…

We propose policy gradient algorithms for solving a risk-sensitive reinforcement learning (RL) problem in on-policy as well as off-policy settings. We consider episodic Markov decision processes, and model the risk using the broad class of…

We formulate the loop-free, binary superoptimization task as a stochastic search problem. The competing constraints of transformation correctness and performance improvement are encoded as terms in a cost function, and a Markov Chain Monte…

This paper develops a framework for quantile regression in binary longitudinal data settings. A novel Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method is designed to fit the model and its computational efficiency is demonstrated in a simulation…

We introduce a revised derivation of the bitwise Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) detector. The new approach resolves the previously reported high SNR stalling problem of MCMC without the need for…

An algorithm is proposed to solve robust control problems constrained by partial differential equations with uncertain coefficients, based on the so-called MG/OPT framework. The levels in this MG/OPT hierarchy correspond to discretization…

Advances in digital sensors, digital data storage and communications have resulted in systems being capable of accumulating large collections of data. In the light of dealing with the challenges that massive data present, this work proposes…

Parallel tempering is a meta-algorithm for Markov Chain Monte Carlo that uses multiple chains to sample from tempered versions of the target distribution, enhancing mixing in multi-modal distributions that are challenging for traditional…

In this paper, we address the challenge of Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms within the approximate Bayesian Computation (ABC) framework, which often get trapped in local optima due to their inherent local exploration mechanism. We…

This paper considers an optimization problem for a dynamical system whose evolution depends on a collection of binary decision variables. We develop scalable approximation algorithms with provable suboptimality bounds to provide…

Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampling methods are widely used but often encounter either slow convergence or biased sampling when applied to multimodal high dimensional distributions. In this paper, we present a general framework of…

Markov chain Monte Carlo is a class of algorithms for drawing Markovian samples from high-dimensional target densities to approximate the numerical integration associated with computing statistical expectation, especially in Bayesian…

As it has become common to use many computer cores in routine applications, finding good ways to parallelize popular algorithms has become increasingly important. In this paper, we present a parallelization scheme for Markov chain Monte…

Sequential Monte Carlo methods, also known as particle methods, are a popular set of techniques for approximating high-dimensional probability distributions and their normalizing constants. These methods have found numerous applications in…

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods are sampling methods that have become a commonly used tool in statistics, for example to perform Monte Carlo integration. As a consequence of the increase in computational power, many variations of…

Bayesian max-margin models have shown superiority in various practical applications, such as text categorization, collaborative prediction, social network link prediction and crowdsourcing, and they conjoin the flexibility of Bayesian…

We consider the problem of controlling a fully specified Markov decision process (MDP), also known as the planning problem, when the state space is very large and calculating the optimal policy is intractable. Instead, we pursue the more…

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms provide a very general recipe for estimating properties of complicated distributions. While their use has become commonplace and there is a large literature on MCMC theory and practice, MCMC users…

Stochastic optimization in learning and inference often relies on Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) to approximate gradients when exact computation is intractable. However, finite-time MCMC estimators are biased, and reducing this bias…

In many operations management problems, we need to make decisions sequentially to minimize the cost while satisfying certain constraints. One modeling approach to study such problems is constrained Markov decision process (CMDP). When…

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms are widely used to sample from complicated distributions, especially to sample from the posterior distribution in Bayesian inference. However, MCMC is not directly applicable when facing the doubly…