Related papers: Provably Feasible and Stable White-Box Trajectory …
Black-box optimization (BBO) can be used to optimize functions whose analytic form is unknown. A common approach to realising BBO is to learn a surrogate model which approximates the target black-box function which can then be solved via…
We evaluate and extend the solution methods for models with binary and multiple continuous choice variables in dynamic programming, particularly in cases where a discrete state space solution method is not viable. Therefore, we approximate…
Machine-learned black-box policies are ubiquitous for nonlinear control problems. Meanwhile, crude model information is often available for these problems from, e.g., linear approximations of nonlinear dynamics. We study the problem of…
Jerk-constrained trajectories offer a wide range of advantages that collectively improve the performance of robotic systems, including increased energy efficiency, durability, and safety. In this paper, we present a novel approach to…
We consider robust discrete minimization problems where uncertainty is defined by a convex set in the objective. We show how an integrality gap verifier for the linear programming relaxation of the non-robust version of the problem can be…
Navigating a collision-free and optimal trajectory for a robot is a challenging task, particularly in environments with moving obstacles such as humans. We formulate this problem as a stochastic optimal control problem. Since solving the…
Although Trajectory Optimization (TO) is one of the most powerful motion planning tools, it suffers from expensive computational complexity as a time horizon increases in cluttered environments. It can also fail to converge to a globally…
We propose a convex optimization procedure for black-box identification of nonlinear state-space models for systems that exhibit stable limit cycles (unforced periodic solutions). It extends the "robust identification error" framework in…
We introduce a sequential learning algorithm to address a robust controller tuning problem, which in effect, finds (with high probability) a candidate solution satisfying the internal performance constraint to a chance-constrained program…
Approximate dynamic programming has been investigated and used as a method to approximately solve optimal regulation problems. However, the extension of this technique to optimal tracking problems for continuous time nonlinear systems has…
Time-Optimal Path Parameterization (TOPP) is a well-studied problem in robotics and has a wide range of applications. There are two main families of methods to address TOPP: Numerical Integration (NI) and Convex Optimization (CO). NI-based…
The problem of interest is the minimization of a nonlinear function subject to nonlinear equality constraints using a sequential quadratic programming (SQP) method. The minimization must be performed while observing only noisy evaluations…
A worst-case complexity bound is proved for a sequential quadratic optimization (commonly known as SQP) algorithm that has been designed for solving optimization problems involving a stochastic objective function and deterministic nonlinear…
Time-distributed Optimization (TDO) is an approach for reducing the computational burden of Model Predictive Control (MPC). When using TDO, optimization iterations are distributed over time by maintaining a running solution estimate and…
This paper studies motion planning of a mobile robot under uncertainty. The control objective is to synthesize a {finite-memory} control policy, such that a high-level task specified as a Linear Temporal Logic (LTL) formula is satisfied…
In real-time systems optimization, designers often face a challenging problem posed by the non-convex and non-continuous schedulability conditions, which may even lack an analytical form to understand their properties. To tackle this…
This paper presents the Safe Sequential Quadratically Constrained Quadratic Programming (SS-QCQP) algorithm, a first-order method for smooth inequality-constrained nonconvex optimization that guarantees feasibility at every iteration. The…
We study the problem of black-box optimization of a function f of any dimension, given function evaluations perturbed by noise. The function is assumed to be locally smooth around one of its global optima, but this smoothness is unknown.…
We consider the problem of generating a time-optimal quadrotor trajectory that attains a set of prescribed waypoints. This problem is challenging since the optimal trajectory is located on the boundary of the set of dynamically feasible…
As a core part of autonomous driving systems, motion planning has received extensive attention from academia and industry. However, real-time trajectory planning capable of spatial-temporal joint optimization is challenged by nonholonomic…