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As the use of autonomous robots expands in tasks that are complex and challenging to model, the demand for robust data-driven control methods that can certify safety and stability in uncertain conditions is increasing. However, the…

We consider a simulation optimization problem for a context-dependent decision-making, which aims to determine the top-m designs for all contexts. Under a Bayesian framework, we formulate the optimal dynamic sampling decision as a…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2023-06-12 Gongbo Zhang , Sihua Chen , Kuihua Huang , Yijie Peng

Motion Cueing Algorithms (MCAs) encode the movement of simulated vehicles into movement that can be reproduced with a motion simulator to provide a realistic driving experience within the capabilities of the machine. This paper introduces a…

Robotics · Computer Science 2025-04-11 Camilo Gonzalez Arango , Houshyar Asadi , Mohammad Reza Chalak Qazani , Chee Peng Lim

This paper proposes a Model Predictive Control (MPC) algorithm for target tracking amongst static and dynamic obstacles. Our main contribution lies in improving the computational tractability and reliability of the underlying non-convex…

Robotics · Computer Science 2021-12-24 Houman Masnavi , Vivek Adajania , Karl Kruusamae , Arun Kumar Singh

Inspired by the principle of deliberate practice in human learning, we propose Deliberate Practice for Synthetic Data Generation (DP), a novel framework that improves sample efficiency through dynamic synthetic data generation. Prior work…

We propose a novel framework for enhancing robotic adaptability and learning efficiency, which integrates unsupervised trajectory segmentation with adaptive probabilistic movement primitives (ProMPs). By employing a cutting-edge deep…

Robotics · Computer Science 2024-05-01 Tianci Gao

Designing control inputs for a system that involves dynamical responses in multiple timescales is nontrivial. This paper proposes a parameterized time-warping function to enable a non-uniformly sampling along a prediction horizon given some…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2023-03-22 Zehui Lu , Shaoshuai Mou

Model-based policy optimization often struggles with inaccurate system dynamics models, leading to suboptimal closed-loop performance. This challenge is especially evident in Model Predictive Control (MPC) policies, which rely on the model…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2026-04-21 Riccardo Zuliani , Efe C. Balta , John Lygeros

This paper presents a distributed model predictive control (DMPC) scheme for nonlinear continuous-time systems. The underlying distributed optimal control problem is cooperatively solved in parallel via a sensitivity-based algorithm. The…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-06-06 Maximilian Pierer von Esch , Andreas Völz , Knut Graichen

This paper studies the dynamic programming principle using the measurable selection method for stochastic control of continuous processes. The novelty of this work is to incorporate intermediate expectation constraints on the canonical…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2020-04-22 Yuk-Loong Chow , Xiang Yu , Chao Zhou

Sampling-based model predictive control methods like MPPI and CEM are essential for real-time control of nonlinear robotic systems, particularly where discontinuous dynamics preclude gradient-based optimization. However, these methods…

Robotics · Computer Science 2026-05-05 Vincent Pacelli , Akash Ratheesh , Evangelos A. Theodorou

Real-world applications of contextual bandits often exhibit non-stationarity due to seasonality, serendipity, and evolving social trends. While a number of non-stationary contextual bandit learning algorithms have been proposed in the…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-10-17 Zheqing Zhu , Yueyang Liu , Xu Kuang , Benjamin Van Roy

Model predictive control is a well established control technology for trajectory tracking. Its use requires the availability of an accurate model of the plant, but obtaining such a model is often time consuming and costly. Data-Enabled…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2025-10-01 Margarita A. Guerrero , Braghadeesh Lakshminarayanan , Cristian R. Rojas

Diffusion models have become popular for policy learning in robotics due to their ability to capture high-dimensional and multimodal distributions. However, diffusion policies are stochastic and typically trained offline, limiting their…

Robotics · Computer Science 2025-05-28 Ralf Römer , Alexander von Rohr , Angela P. Schoellig

How much explicit guidance is necessary for conditional diffusion? We consider the problem of conditional sampling using an unconditional diffusion model and limited explicit guidance (e.g., a noised classifier, or a conditional diffusion…

Constraint-based control approaches offer a flexible way to specify robotic manipulation tasks and execute them on robots with many degrees of freedom. However, the specification of task constraints and their associated priorities usually…

Robotics · Computer Science 2021-04-14 Dennis Mronga , Frank Kirchner

We develop a novel form of differentiable predictive control (DPC) with safety and robustness guarantees based on control barrier functions. DPC is an unsupervised learning-based method for obtaining approximate solutions to explicit model…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2022-08-05 Wenceslao Shaw Cortez , Jan Drgona , Aaron Tuor , Mahantesh Halappanavar , Draguna Vrabie

Given an unknown dynamical system, what is the minimum number of samples needed for effective learning of its governing laws and accurate prediction of its future evolution behavior, and how to select these critical samples? In this work,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-01-15 Ce Zhang , Kailiang Wu , Zhihai He

Model predictive control (MPC) is an effective method for control of constrained systems but is susceptible to the external disturbances and modeling error often encountered in real-world applications. To address these issues, techniques…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2020-12-24 Savva Morozov , Parker C. Lusk , Brett T. Lopez , Jonathan P. How

Modern world models are becoming too complex to admit explicit dynamical descriptions. We study safety-critical contextual control, where a Planner must optimize a task objective using only feasibility samples from a black-box Simulator,…

Systems and Control · Electrical Eng. & Systems 2026-04-22 Tongxin Li