[Colloquium] Seminar Announcement: Compact Representations of Stochastic Multi-Agent Planning Problems - TODAY!

[Ninfa Mayorga]

Computation Institute- Data Lunch Seminar (DLS)

Speaker: Josh Bryan, Computation Institute, The University of Chicago
Host: Tanu Malik
Date: July 29, 2011
Time: 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
Location: The University of Chicago, Searle 240A, 5735 S. Ellis Avenue

Compact Representations of Stochastic Multi-Agent Planning Problems

Abstract: Many problems, ranging from automated driving to online  
poker, require an agent to estimate the state of a system and  
formulate a plan with incomplete information. Partially Observable  
Markov Decision Processes (POMDPs) provide a rich planning and  
modeling framework for agents in stochastic environments with  
incomplete information. Furthermore, Interactive POMDPs (I-POMDPs)  
extend this framework to include interactions with other agents in the  
environment. Unfortunately, planning and state estimation in partially  
observable domains have several sources of complexity. Often, the  
space of possible states of the system may be large, unknown, or even  
infinite. Another source of complexity is that the number of plans  
that must be considered is exponential in the number actions and  
observations that may be received by the agent. One way to handle  
filtering in these domains is to use Monte Carlo methods such as  
particle filters. However, even when sampling techniques ar e  
employed, it may still be computationally difficult to employ enough  
samples to adequately represent the distribution over states. To  
tackle these issues, in our research we explore ways to collapse the  
state, action, and observation spaces of I-POMDPs using first order  
logic. By using first order logic to exploit regularity in some  
domains, we are able to efficiently plan in more complex systems.

Bio:
Josh Bryan was born in Missouri and where he attended highschool. He  
earned his B.A. in computer science from the University of Missouri at  
Columbia. After a few years working as a software engineer at various  
firms, he returned to school at the University of Illinois at Chicago.  
After receiving a Masters in Computer Science, he continued as a Ph.D.  
student under Dr. Piotr Gmytrasiewicz. Today, he is working at the CI  
as a programmer while finishing his dissertation at UIC.

Information: Lunch will be provided