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Distributional reinforcement learning (RL) -- in which agents learn about all the possible long-term consequences of their actions, and not just the expected value -- is of great recent interest. One of the most important affordances of a…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2021-11-15 Chris Gagne , Peter Dayan

Reinforcement learning (RL) has achieved enormous progress in solving various sequential decision-making problems, such as control tasks in robotics. Since policies are overfitted to training environments, RL methods have often failed to be…

Robotics · Computer Science 2023-03-21 Xiao Wang , Saasha Nair , Matthias Althoff

In many real-world applications, safety constraints for reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms are either unknown or not explicitly defined. We propose a framework that concurrently learns safety constraints and optimal RL policies in such…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2023-05-02 Lunet Yifru , Ali Baheri

This paper presents a model-free reinforcement learning (RL) algorithm to solve the risk-averse optimal control (RAOC) problem for discrete-time nonlinear systems. While successful RL algorithms have been presented to learn optimal control…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2021-03-29 Yuzhen Han , Majid Mazouchi , Subramanya Nageshrao , Hamidreza Modares

Reinforcement learning (RL) has revolutionized decision-making across a wide range of domains over the past few decades. Yet, deploying RL policies in real-world scenarios presents the crucial challenge of ensuring safety. Traditional safe…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2024-03-26 Lunet Yifru , Ali Baheri

This paper studies the constrained/safe reinforcement learning (RL) problem with sparse indicator signals for constraint violations. We propose a model-based approach to enable RL agents to effectively explore the environment with unknown…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2021-03-09 Zuxin Liu , Hongyi Zhou , Baiming Chen , Sicheng Zhong , Martial Hebert , Ding Zhao

The safety of training task policies and their subsequent application using reinforcement learning (RL) methods has become a focal point in the field of safe RL. A central challenge in this area remains the establishment of theoretical…

Robotics · Computer Science 2025-05-02 Chenggang Wang , Xinyi Wang , Yutong Dong , Lei Song , Xinping Guan

Safe reinforcement learning (SafeRL) extends standard reinforcement learning with the idea of safety, where safety is typically defined through the constraint of the expected cost return of a trajectory being below a set limit. However,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-09-04 David Eckel , Baohe Zhang , Joschka Bödecker

Ensuring safety in autonomous driving (AD) remains a significant challenge, especially in highly dynamic and complex traffic environments where diverse agents interact and unexpected hazards frequently emerge. Traditional reinforcement…

Robotics · Computer Science 2025-10-14 Dong Hu , Fenqing Hu , Lidong Yang , Chao Huang

In collaborative human-robot tasks, safety requires not only avoiding collisions but also ensuring safe, intentional physical contact. We present ContactRL, a reinforcement learning (RL) based framework that directly incorporates contact…

Robotics · Computer Science 2025-12-04 Sundas Rafat Mulkana , Ronyu Yu , Tanaya Guha , Emma Li

We propose a novel benchmark environment for Safe Reinforcement Learning focusing on aquatic navigation. Aquatic navigation is an extremely challenging task due to the non-stationary environment and the uncertainties of the robotic…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-12-21 Enrico Marchesini , Davide Corsi , Alessandro Farinelli

Reinforcement learning (RL) is a promising approach for robotic navigation, allowing robots to learn through trial and error. However, real-world robotic tasks often suffer from sparse rewards, leading to inefficient exploration and…

We study a class of constrained reinforcement learning (RL) problems in which multiple constraint specifications are not identified before training. It is challenging to identify appropriate constraint specifications due to the undefined…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-01-02 Dongsheng Ding , Zhengyan Huan , Alejandro Ribeiro

We consider the problem of finding optimal policies for a Markov Decision Process with almost sure constraints on state transitions and action triplets. We define value and action-value functions that satisfy a barrier-based decomposition…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-12-25 Agustin Castellano , Juan Bazerque , Enrique Mallada

In safety-critical decision-making, the environment may evolve over time, and the learner adjusts its risk level accordingly. This work investigates risk-averse online optimization in dynamic environments with varying risk levels, employing…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2025-12-30 Siyi Wang , Zifan Wang , Karl H. Johansson

Conditional Value-at-Risk (CVaR) is a widely used risk metric in applications such as finance. We derive concentration bounds for CVaR estimates, considering separately the cases of light-tailed and heavy-tailed distributions. In the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-08-27 Prashanth L. A. , Krishna Jagannathan , Ravi Kumar Kolla

In this paper, we consider the problem of learning safe policies for probabilistic-constrained reinforcement learning (RL). Specifically, a safe policy or controller is one that, with high probability, maintains the trajectory of the agent…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-03-14 Weiqin Chen , Dharmashankar Subramanian , Santiago Paternain

Safe reinforcement learning deals with mitigating or avoiding unsafe situations by reinforcement learning (RL) agents. Safe RL approaches are based on specific risk representations for particular problems or domains. In order to analyze…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-12-11 Leonardo Villalobos-Arias , Derek Martin , Abhijeet Krishnan , Madeleine Gagné , Colin M. Potts , Arnav Jhala

While safe reinforcement learning (RL) holds great promise for many practical applications like robotics or autonomous cars, current approaches require specifying constraints in mathematical form. Such specifications demand domain…

Computation and Language · Computer Science 2021-08-05 Tsung-Yen Yang , Michael Hu , Yinlam Chow , Peter J. Ramadge , Karthik Narasimhan

Constrained Markov Decision Processes are a class of stochastic decision problems in which the decision maker must select a policy that satisfies auxiliary cost constraints. This paper extends upper confidence reinforcement learning for…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-01-28 Liyuan Zheng , Lillian J. Ratliff