Publications related to Follow the Clairvoyant: an Imitation Learning Approach to Optimal Control

Stability: a search for structure

In this thesis we study stability from several viewpoints. After covering the practical importance, the rich history and the ever-growing list of manifestations of stability, we study the following. (i) (Statistical identification of stable dynamical syste ...

EPFL2024

Quantifying the Unknown: Data-Driven Approaches and Applications in Energy Systems

Paul Scharnhorst

In light of the challenges posed by climate change and the goals of the Paris Agreement, electricity generation is shifting to a more renewable and decentralized pattern, while the operation of systems like buildings is increasingly electrified. This calls ...

EPFL2024

Hybrid Quadratic Programming - Pullback Bundle Dynamical Systems Control

Aude Billard, Bernardo Fichera

Dynamical System (DS)-based closed-loop control is a simple and effective way to generate reactive motion policies that well generalize to the robotic workspace, while retaining stability guarantees. Lately the formalism has been expanded in order to handl ...

SPRINGER INTERNATIONAL PUBLISHING AG2023

Universal and adaptive methods for robust stochastic optimization

Ali Kavis

Within the context of contemporary machine learning problems, efficiency of optimization process depends on the properties of the model and the nature of the data available, which poses a significant problem as the complexity of either increases ad infinit ...

EPFL2023

Beyond worst-case analysis, with or without predictions

Andreas Maggiori

In this thesis we design online combinatorial optimization algorithms for beyond worst-case analysis settings. In the first part, we discuss the online matching problem and prove that, in the edge arrival model, no online algorithm can achieve a competiti ...

EPFL2023

Data-driven Methods for Control: from Linear to Lifting

Yingzhao Lian

The progress towards intelligent systems and digitalization relies heavily on the use of automation technology. However, the growing diversity of control objects presents significant challenges for traditional control approaches, as they are highly depende ...

EPFL2023

High-dimensional optimization under nonconvex excluded volume constraints

Antonio Sclocchi

We consider high-dimensional random optimization problems where the dynamical variables are subjected to nonconvex excluded volume constraints. We focus on the case in which the cost function is a simple quadratic cost and the excluded volume constraints a ...

AMER PHYSICAL SOC2022

Optimization and equilibrium problems with discrete choice models

Stefano Bortolomiol

Many transportation markets are characterized by oligopolistic competition. In these markets customers, suppliers and regulators make decisions that are influenced by the preferences and the decisions of all other agents. In particular, capturing and under ...

EPFL2022

On Topological Equivalence in Linear Quadratic Optimal Control

Daniel Kuhn, Wouter Jongeneel

Dynamical systems are topologically equivalent when their orbits can be mapped onto each other via a homeomorphic change of coordinates. We will show that in general, closed-loop systems resulting from Linear Quadratic Optimal Control problems are all topo ...

2021

Learning From Demonstration and Interactive Control of Variable-Impedance to Cut Soft Tissues

Aude Billard, Rui Wu

In this article, we propose an approach to extract variable-impedance during cutting tasks from human demonstrations, so as to ease soft-tissue cutting by robots. We model the dynamic adjustment of the human arm during interactions with the tissue and tran ...

2021

Learning dynamical systems with bifurcations

Aude Billard, Ilaria Lauzana, Farshad Khadivar

Trajectory planning through dynamical systems (DS) provides robust control for robots and has found numerous applications from locomotion to manipulation. However, to date, DS for controlling rhythmic patterns are distinct from DS used to control point to ...

Elsevier2021

Complexity analysis of stochastic gradient methods for PDE-constrained optimal control problems with uncertain parameters

Fabio Nobile, Matthieu Claude Martin, Sebastian Krumscheid

We consider the numerical approximation of an optimal control problem for an elliptic Partial Differential Equation (PDE) with random coefficients. Specifically, the control function is a deterministic, distributed forcing term that minimizes the expected ...

2021

Optimal Control Combining Emulation and Imitation to Acquire Physical Assistance Skills

Sylvain Calinon, Teguh Santoso Lembono, Amirreza Razmjoo Fard

paper studies exploiting action-level learning (imitation) in the optimal control problem context. Cost functions defined by the optimal control methods are similar to the goal-level learning (emulation) in animals. However, imitating the robot's or others ...

IEEE2021

Arm-hand motion-force coordination for physical interactions with non-flat surfaces using dynamical systems: Toward compliant robotic massage

Aude Billard, Mahdi Khoramshahi, Seyed Sina Mirrazavi Salehian, Aileen Charlotte Naef, Karl Gustav Henriks

Many manipulation tasks require coordinated motions for arm and fingers. Complexity increases when the task requires to control for the force at contact against a non-flat surface; This becomes even more challenging when this contact is done on a human. Al ...

IEEE2020

Optimization-based Control, Estimation, and Identification of Urban Road Transport Systems

Isik Ilber Sirmatel

Urbanization intensifies as a global trend, exposing transportation networks to ever increasing levels of congestion. As network usage increases with available infrastructure, building new roads is not a solution. Design of intelligent transportation syste ...

EPFL2020

On the relaxed maximum-likelihood blind MIMO channel estimation for orthogonal space-time block codes

Kamran Kalbasi

This paper concerns the maximum-likelihood channel estimation for MIMO systems with orthogonal space-time block codes when the finite alphabet constraint of the signal constellation is relaxed. We study the channel coefficients estimation subspace generate ...

ELSEVIER2020

The (h, k)-Server Problem on Bounded Depth Trees

Marek Elias

We study the k-server problem in the resource augmentation setting, i.e., when the performance of the online algorithm with k servers is compared to the offline optimal solution with h

ASSOC COMPUTING MACHINERY2019

Low-Complexity Optimization-Based Control: Design, Methods and Applications

Ivan Pejcic

Optimization-based controllers are advanced control systems whose mechanism of determining control inputs requires the solution of a mathematical optimization problem. In this thesis, several contributions related to the computational effort required for o ...

EPFL2019

Concept of Variants and Invariants for Reaction Systems, with Application to Estimation, Control and Optimization

Diogo Filipe Mateus Rodrigues

The concept of reaction variants and invariants for lumped reaction systems has been known for several decades. Its applications encompass model identification, data reconciliation, state estimation and control using kinetic models. In this thesis, the con ...

EPFL2018

PDE-Constrained Optimal Control Problems with Uncertain Parameters using SAGA

Fabio Nobile, Matthieu Claude Martin

We consider an optimal control problem (OCP) for a partial differential equation (PDE) with random coefficients. The optimal control function is a deterministic, distributed forcing term that minimizes an expected quadratic regularized loss functional. For ...

2021