Related papers: Reach-avoid semi-Markov decision processes with ti…
This article deals with stochastic processes endowed with the Markov (memoryless) property and evolving over general (uncountable) state spaces. The models further depend on a non-deterministic quantity in the form of a control input, which…
The maximization of reach-avoid probabilities for stochastic systems is a central topic in the control literature. Yet, the available methods are either restricted to low-dimensional systems or suffer from conservative approximations. To…
In this paper we propose a novel semi-definite programming approach that solves reach-avoid problems over open (i.e., not bounded a priori) time horizons for dynamical systems modeled by polynomial stochastic differential equations. The…
One of the most fundamental problems in Markov decision processes is analysis and control synthesis for safety and reachability specifications. We consider the stochastic reach-avoid problem, in which the objective is to synthesize a…
In the context of Markov decision processes running in continuous time, one of the most intriguing challenges is the efficient approximation of finite horizon reachability objectives. A multitude of sophisticated model checking algorithms…
We consider the problem of approximating the reachability probabilities in Markov decision processes (MDP) with uncountable (continuous) state and action spaces. While there are algorithms that, for special classes of such MDP, provide a…
We consider finite horizon reach-avoid problems for discrete time stochastic systems. Our goal is to construct upper bound functions for the reach-avoid probability by means of tractable convex optimization problems. We achieve this by…
Markov decision processes model systems subject to nondeterministic and probabilistic uncertainty. A plethora of verification techniques addresses variations of reachability properties, such as: Is there a scheduler resolving the…
We introduce the notion of quantum Markov decision process (qMDP) as a semantic model of nondeterministic and concurrent quantum programs. It is shown by examples that qMDPs can be used in analysis of quantum algorithms and protocols. We…
We consider discrete-time Markov decision processes in which the decision maker is interested in long but finite horizons. First we consider reachability objective: the decision maker's goal is to reach a specific target state with the…
Model-based reinforcement learning seeks to simultaneously learn the dynamics of an unknown stochastic environment and synthesise an optimal policy for acting in it. Ensuring the safety and robustness of sequential decisions made through a…
In this paper we propose novel optimization-based methods for verifying reach-avoid (or, eventuality) properties of continuous-time systems modelled by ordinary differential equations. Given a system, an initial set, a safe set and a target…
We optimize finite horizon multi-agent reach-avoid Markov decision process (MDP) via \emph{local feedback policies}. The global feedback policy solution yields global optimality but its communication complexity, memory usage and computation…
This article presents the complexity of reachability decision problems for parametric Markov decision processes (pMDPs), an extension to Markov decision processes (MDPs) where transitions probabilities are described by polynomials over a…
We develop a stochastic approximation-type algorithm to solve finite state/action, infinite-horizon, risk-aware Markov decision processes. Our algorithm has two loops. The inner loop computes the risk by solving a stochastic saddle-point…
Many control problems in environments that can be modeled as Markov decision processes (MDPs) concern infinite-time horizon specifications. The classical aim in this context is to compute a control policy that maximizes the probability of…
This paper considers the problem of finding strategies that satisfy a mixture of sure and threshold objectives in Markov decision processes. We focus on a single $\omega$-regular objective expressed as parity that must be surely met while…
We study computational and statistical aspects of learning Latent Markov Decision Processes (LMDPs). In this model, the learner interacts with an MDP drawn at the beginning of each epoch from an unknown mixture of MDPs. To sidestep known…
We consider finite horizon Markov decision processes under performance measures that involve both the mean and the variance of the cumulative reward. We show that either randomized or history-based policies can improve performance. We prove…
We prove new upper and lower bounds for sample complexity of finding an $\epsilon$-optimal policy of an infinite-horizon average-reward Markov decision process (MDP) given access to a generative model. When the mixing time of the…