相关论文: A Gauss-Newton Method for Markov Decision Processe…

We introduce a new second order stochastic algorithm to estimate the entropically regularized optimal transport cost between two probability measures. The source measure can be arbitrary chosen, either absolutely continuous or discrete,…

Machine learning (ML) problems are often posed as highly nonlinear and nonconvex unconstrained optimization problems. Methods for solving ML problems based on stochastic gradient descent are easily scaled for very large problems but may…

This paper considers the problem of finding near-optimal Markovian randomized (MR) policies for finite-state-action, infinite-horizon, constrained risk-sensitive Markov decision processes (CRSMDPs). Constraints are in the form of standard…

Many machine learning models involve solving optimization problems. Thus, it is important to deal with a large-scale optimization problem in big data applications. Recently, subsampled Newton methods have emerged to attract much attention…

Accelerating the convergence of second-order optimization, particularly Newton-type methods, remains a pivotal challenge in algorithmic research. In this paper, we extend previous work on the \textbf{Quadratic Gradient (QG)} and rigorously…

We propose the generalized Newton's method (GeN) -- a Hessian-informed approach that applies to any optimizer such as SGD and Adam, and covers the Newton-Raphson method as a sub-case. Our method automatically and dynamically selects the…

The majority of machine learning methods can be regarded as the minimization of an unavailable risk function. To optimize the latter, given samples provided in a streaming fashion, we define a general stochastic Newton algorithm and its…

We present Exact Gauss-Newton (EGN), a stochastic second-order optimization algorithm that combines the generalized Gauss-Newton (GN) Hessian approximation with low-rank linear algebra to compute the descent direction. Leveraging the…

In this work, we investigate stochastic quasi-Newton methods for minimizing a finite sum of cost functions over a decentralized network. In Part I, we develop a general algorithmic framework that incorporates stochastic quasi-Newton…

We present the first finite time global convergence analysis of policy gradient in the context of infinite horizon average reward Markov decision processes (MDPs). Specifically, we focus on ergodic tabular MDPs with finite state and action…

We study the policy testing problem in discounted Markov decision processes (MDPs) in the fixed-confidence setting under a generative model with static sampling. The goal is to decide whether the value of a given policy exceeds a specified…

The problem of constrained Markov decision process (CMDP) is investigated, where an agent aims to maximize the expected accumulated discounted reward subject to multiple constraints on its utilities/costs. A new primal-dual approach is…

Update formulas for the Hessian approximations in quasi-Newton methods such as BFGS can be derived as analytical solutions to certain nearest-matrix problems. In this article, we propose a similar idea for deriving new limited memory…

We investigate the problem of best-policy identification in discounted Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) when the learner has access to a generative model. The objective is to devise a learning algorithm returning the best policy as early as…

Stochastic second-order methods achieve fast local convergence in strongly convex optimization by using noisy Hessian estimates to precondition the gradient. However, these methods typically reach superlinear convergence only when the…

A novel dynamical inertial Newton system, which is called Hessian-driven Nesterov accelerated gradient (H-NAG) flow is proposed. Convergence of the continuous trajectory are established via tailored Lyapunov function, and new first-order…

Minimizing loss functions is central to machine-learning training. Although first-order methods dominate practical applications, higher-order techniques such as Newton's method can deliver greater accuracy and faster convergence, yet are…

We study infinite-horizon Discounted Markov Decision Processes (DMDPs) under a generative model. Motivated by the Algorithm with Advice framework Mitzenmacher and Vassilvitskii 2022, we propose a novel framework to investigate how a…

Quasi-Newton techniques approximate the Newton step by estimating the Hessian using the so-called secant equations. Some of these methods compute the Hessian using several secant equations but produce non-symmetric updates. Other…

Novel advanced policy gradient (APG) methods, such as Trust Region policy optimization and Proximal policy optimization (PPO), have become the dominant reinforcement learning algorithms because of their ease of implementation and good…