ABSTRACT

Reinforcement learning (RL) is a framework for decision making in unknown environments based on a large amount of data. Several practical RL applications for business intelligence, plant control, and gaming have been successfully explored in recent years. Providing an accessible introduction to the field, this book covers model-based and model-free approaches, policy iteration, and policy search methods. It presents illustrative examples and state-of-the-art results, including dimensionality reduction in RL and risk-sensitive RL. The book provides a bridge between RL and data mining and machine learning research.

part 1|2 pages

Part I: Introduction

chapter 1|12 pages

Introduction to Reinforcement Learning

part 2|2 pages

Part II: Model-Free Policy Iteration

chapter 4|18 pages

Sample Reuse in Policy Iteration

chapter 5|14 pages

Active Learning in Policy Iteration

chapter 6|14 pages

Robust Policy Iteration

part 3|2 pages

Part III: Model-Free Policy Search

chapter 7|22 pages

Direct Policy Search by Gradient Ascent

chapter 9|22 pages

Policy-Prior Search

part 4|2 pages

Part IV: Model-Based Reinforcement Learning

chapter 10|16 pages

Transition Model Estimation