arXiv:2609.10529v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: We prove the gap-entropy conjecture for fixed-confidence best-arm identification with independent unit-variance Gaussian arms, means in $[0,1]$, and...
We prove the gap-entropy conjecture for fixed-confidence best-arm identification with independent unit-variance Gaussian arms, means in $[0,1]$, and a unique optimal arm. For each suboptimal arm $i$,...
arXiv:2607. 16966v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Estimating entropy from samples is fundamental in information theory and property testing.
arXiv:2608. 15365v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Regret minimization (RM) and best-arm identification (BAI) are two fundamental objectives in multi-armed bandits.
arXiv:2606. 14690v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: We study a \emph{max-risk} objective for active learning in a multi-group mean estimation $d$-armed bandits: a learner adaptively allocates a budget of $T$ samples across $d$ groups to minimize the worst-case uncertainty index $\max_{k\in[d]}\sigma_k^2/n_k$, where $\sigma_k$ is the standard deviation of the distribution of arm $d$, and $n_k$ is the number of times arm $d$ is sampled.
arXiv:2509. 03734v3 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: In the hypothesis selection problem, we are given sample and query access to finite set of candidate distributions (hypotheses), $\mathcal{H} = \{H_1, \ldots, H_n\}$, and samples from an unknown distribution $P$, both over a domain $\mathcal{X}$.
arXiv:2606. 25170v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: We study PAC learning in tabular discounted Markov decision processes with exogenous i.
arXiv:2509. 16586v2 Announce Type: replace Abstract: Recent advances have significantly improved our understanding of the sample complexity of learning in average-reward Markov decision processes (AMDPs) under the generative model.
The paper establishes the optimal incremental first‑order oracle (IFO) complexity for nonconvex finite‑sum optimization under individual smoothness, proving a matching lower bound that closes a previously missing √{n} factor. It also refines the analysis of the PAGE algorithm under the global Polyak‑Lojasiewicz condition, providing tighter guarantees for different ranges of the condition number. The authors introduce a novel dense weak hiding construction that yields these lower bounds and demonstrates the limits of existing methods.
arXiv:2608. 06337v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: A monotone adversary observes an i.
arXiv:2004. 05813v3 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Suppose that we are given independent, identically distributed random samples $x_1,\cdots,x_n$ from a mixture at most $k$ many $d$-dimensional spherical Gaussian distributions $\mu_1,\cdots,\mu_{k_0}$ of identical and known variance $\sigma^2$ in each coordinate, such that the minimum $\ell^2$ distance between two distinct centers $y_l$ and $y_j$ is greater than $2\Delta\sigma \min\{\sqrt{d},\sqrt k\}$, where $\Delta>C_0$, and $C_0$ is a sufficiently large universal constant.
arXiv:2607. 11635v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: In fixed-budget best-arm identification, also known as ranking and selection, an algorithm has a sampling budget to distribute across $K$ arms.