13,609 research outputs found
Element Distinctness, Frequency Moments, and Sliding Windows
We derive new time-space tradeoff lower bounds and algorithms for exactly
computing statistics of input data, including frequency moments, element
distinctness, and order statistics, that are simple to calculate for sorted
data. We develop a randomized algorithm for the element distinctness problem
whose time T and space S satisfy T in O (n^{3/2}/S^{1/2}), smaller than
previous lower bounds for comparison-based algorithms, showing that element
distinctness is strictly easier than sorting for randomized branching programs.
This algorithm is based on a new time and space efficient algorithm for finding
all collisions of a function f from a finite set to itself that are reachable
by iterating f from a given set of starting points. We further show that our
element distinctness algorithm can be extended at only a polylogarithmic factor
cost to solve the element distinctness problem over sliding windows, where the
task is to take an input of length 2n-1 and produce an output for each window
of length n, giving n outputs in total. In contrast, we show a time-space
tradeoff lower bound of T in Omega(n^2/S) for randomized branching programs to
compute the number of distinct elements over sliding windows. The same lower
bound holds for computing the low-order bit of F_0 and computing any frequency
moment F_k, k neq 1. This shows that those frequency moments and the decision
problem F_0 mod 2 are strictly harder than element distinctness. We complement
this lower bound with a T in O(n^2/S) comparison-based deterministic RAM
algorithm for exactly computing F_k over sliding windows, nearly matching both
our lower bound for the sliding-window version and the comparison-based lower
bounds for the single-window version. We further exhibit a quantum algorithm
for F_0 over sliding windows with T in O(n^{3/2}/S^{1/2}). Finally, we consider
the computations of order statistics over sliding windows.Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1212.437
A Survey of Monte Carlo Tree Search Methods
Monte Carlo tree search (MCTS) is a recently proposed search method that combines the precision of tree search with the generality of random sampling. It has received considerable interest due to its spectacular success in the difficult problem of computer Go, but has also proved beneficial in a range of other domains. This paper is a survey of the literature to date, intended to provide a snapshot of the state of the art after the first five years of MCTS research. We outline the core algorithm's derivation, impart some structure on the many variations and enhancements that have been proposed, and summarize the results from the key game and nongame domains to which MCTS methods have been applied. A number of open research questions indicate that the field is ripe for future work
Finding the Median (Obliviously) with Bounded Space
We prove that any oblivious algorithm using space to find the median of a
list of integers from requires time . This bound also applies to the problem of determining whether the median
is odd or even. It is nearly optimal since Chan, following Munro and Raman, has
shown that there is a (randomized) selection algorithm using only
registers, each of which can store an input value or -bit counter,
that makes only passes over the input. The bound also implies
a size lower bound for read-once branching programs computing the low order bit
of the median and implies the analog of for length oblivious branching programs
A comparison of sample-based Stochastic Optimal Control methods
In this paper, we compare the performance of two scenario-based numerical
methods to solve stochastic optimal control problems: scenario trees and
particles. The problem consists in finding strategies to control a dynamical
system perturbed by exogenous noises so as to minimize some expected cost along
a discrete and finite time horizon. We introduce the Mean Squared Error (MSE)
which is the expected -distance between the strategy given by the
algorithm and the optimal strategy, as a performance indicator for the two
models. We study the behaviour of the MSE with respect to the number of
scenarios used for discretization. The first model, widely studied in the
Stochastic Programming community, consists in approximating the noise diffusion
using a scenario tree representation. On a numerical example, we observe that
the number of scenarios needed to obtain a given precision grows exponentially
with the time horizon. In that sense, our conclusion on scenario trees is
equivalent to the one in the work by Shapiro (2006) and has been widely noticed
by practitioners. However, in the second part, we show using the same example
that, by mixing Stochastic Programming and Dynamic Programming ideas, the
particle method described by Carpentier et al (2009) copes with this numerical
difficulty: the number of scenarios needed to obtain a given precision now does
not depend on the time horizon. Unfortunately, we also observe that serious
obstacles still arise from the system state space dimension
Multistage Stochastic Portfolio Optimisation in Deregulated Electricity Markets Using Linear Decision Rules
The deregulation of electricity markets increases the financial risk faced by retailers who procure electric energy on the spot market to meet their customers’ electricity demand. To hedge against this exposure, retailers often hold a portfolio of electricity derivative contracts. In this paper, we propose a multistage stochastic mean-variance optimisation model for the management of such a portfolio. To reduce computational complexity, we perform two approximations: stage-aggregation and linear decision rules (LDR). The LDR approach consists of restricting the set of decision rules to those affine in the history of the random parameters. When applied to mean-variance optimisation models, it leads to convex quadratic programs. Since their size grows typically only polynomially with the number of periods, they can be efficiently solved. Our numerical experiments illustrate the value of adaptivity inherent in the LDR method and its potential for enabling scalability to problems with many periods.OR in energy, electricity portfolio management, stochastic programming, risk management, linear decision rules
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