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We propose a method of approximating multivariate Gaussian probabilities using dynamic programming. We show that solving the optimization problem associated with a class of discrete-time finite horizon Markov decision processes with…
We study a class of multi-stage stochastic programs, which incorporate modeling features from Markov decision processes (MDPs). This class includes structured MDPs with continuous action and state spaces. We extend policy graphs to include…
Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC), Laplace approximation (LA) and variational inference (VI) methods are popular approaches to Bayesian inference, each with trade-offs between computational cost and accuracy. However, a theoretical…
Basic Parallel Processes (BPPs) are a well-known subclass of Petri Nets. They are the simplest common model of concurrent programs that allows unbounded spawning of processes. In the probabilistic version of BPPs, every process generates…
We here consider the subset simulation method which approaches a failure event using a decreasing sequence of nested intermediate failure events. The method resembles importance sampling, which actively explores a probability space by…
Markov decision processes (MDPs) provide a standard framework for sequential decision making under uncertainty. However, MDPs do not take uncertainty in transition probabilities into account. Robust Markov decision processes (RMDPs) address…
In classical Markov Decision Processes (MDPs), action costs and transition probabilities are assumed to be known, although an accurate estimation of these parameters is often not possible in practice. This study addresses MDPs under cost…
We study the general approach to accelerating the convergence of the most widely used solution method of Markov decision processes with the total expected discounted reward. Inspired by the monotone behavior of the contraction mappings in…
Consider the problem of approximating the optimal policy of a Markov decision process (MDP) by sampling state transitions. In contrast to existing reinforcement learning methods that are based on successive approximations to the nonlinear…
This paper presents a way of solving Markov Decision Processes that combines state abstraction and temporal abstraction. Specifically, we combine state aggregation with the options framework and demonstrate that they work well together and…
Leveraging well-established MCMC strategies, we propose MCMC-interactive variational inference (MIVI) to not only estimate the posterior in a time constrained manner, but also facilitate the design of MCMC transitions. Constructing a…
Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) are a mathematical framework for modeling sequential decision making under uncertainty. The classical approaches for solving MDPs are well known and have been widely studied, some of which rely on…
We present the first finite-sample analysis of policy evaluation in robust average-reward Markov Decision Processes (MDPs). Prior work in this setting have established only asymptotic convergence guarantees, leaving open the question of…
Recently-proposed particle MCMC methods provide a flexible way of performing Bayesian inference for parameters governing stochastic kinetic models defined as Markov (jump) processes (MJPs). Each iteration of the scheme requires an estimate…
Bayesian analysis for Markov jump processes is a non-trivial and challenging problem. Although exact inference is theoretically possible, it is computationally demanding thus its applicability is limited to a small class of problems. In…
The paper addresses two variants of the stochastic shortest path problem ('optimize the accumulated weight until reaching a goal state') in Markov decision processes (MDPs) with integer weights. The first variant optimizes partial expected…
This paper discusses algorithms for solving Markov decision processes (MDPs) that have monotone optimal policies. We propose a two-stage alternating convex optimization scheme that can accelerate the search for an optimal policy by…
Bayesian analysis is widely used in science and engineering for real-time forecasting, decision making, and to help unravel the processes that explain the observed data. These data are some deterministic and/or stochastic transformations of…
Value-at-risk (VaR), also known as quantile, is a crucial risk measure in finance and other fields. However, optimizing VaR metrics in Markov decision processes (MDPs) is challenging because VaR is non-additive and the traditional dynamic…
Markov decision processes are useful models of concurrency optimisation problems, but are often intractable for exhaustive verification methods. Recent work has introduced lightweight approximative techniques that sample directly from…