Optimal control as a graphical model inference problem

We reformulate a class of non-linear stochastic optimal control problems introduced by Todorov (in Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, vol. 19, pp. 1369-1376, 2007) as a Kullback-Leibler (KL) minimization problem. As a result, the optimal control computation reduces to an inference co...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Kappen, Hilbert J., Gómez, Vicenç, Opper, Manfred
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión aceptada para publicación
Fecha de publicación:2012
País:España
Institución:Universitat Pompeu Fabra
Repositorio:Repositorio Digital de la UPF
OAI Identifier:oai:repositori.upf.edu:10230/36355
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10230/36355
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10994-012-5278-7
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Optimal control
Uncontrolled dynamics
Kullback-Leibler divergence
Graphical model
Approximate inference
Cluster variation method
Belief propagation
Descripción
Sumario:We reformulate a class of non-linear stochastic optimal control problems introduced by Todorov (in Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems, vol. 19, pp. 1369-1376, 2007) as a Kullback-Leibler (KL) minimization problem. As a result, the optimal control computation reduces to an inference computation and approximate inference methods can be applied to efficiently compute approximate optimal controls. We show how this KL control theory contains the path integral control method as a special case. We provide an example of a block stacking task and a multi-agent cooperative game where we demonstrate how approximate inference can be successfully applied to instances that are too complex for exact computation. We discuss the relation of the KL control approach to other inference approaches to control.