Automaton based approaches have enabled robots to perform various complex tasks. However, most existing automaton based algorithms highly rely on the manually customized representation of states for the considered task, limiting its applicability in deep reinforcement learning algorithms. To address this issue, by incorporating Transformer into reinforcement learning, we develop a Double-Transformer-guided Temporal Logic framework (T2TL) that exploits the structural feature of Transformer twice, i.e., first encoding the LTL instruction via the Transformer module for efficient understanding of task instructions during the training and then encoding the context variable via the Transformer again for improved task performance. Particularly, the LTL instruction is specified by co-safe LTL. As a semantics-preserving rewriting operation, LTL progression is exploited to decompose the complex task into learnable sub-goals, which not only converts non-Markovian reward decision processes to Markovian ones, but also improves the sampling efficiency by simultaneous learning of multiple sub-tasks. An environment-agnostic LTL pre-training scheme is further incorporated to facilitate the learning of the Transformer module resulting in an improved representation of LTL. The simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the T2TL framework.
Patch robustness certification ensures no patch within a given bound on a sample can manipulate a deep learning model to predict a different label. However, existing techniques cannot certify samples that cannot meet their strict bars at the classifier or patch region levels. This paper proposes MajorCert. MajorCert firstly finds all possible label sets manipulatable by the same patch region on the same sample across the underlying classifiers, then enumerates their combinations element-wise, and finally checks whether the majority invariant of all these combinations is intact to certify samples.
With the advent of powerful quantum computers, the quest for more efficient quantum algorithms becomes crucial in attaining quantum supremacy over classical counterparts in the noisy intermediate-scale quantum era. While Grover's search algorithm and its generalization, quantum amplitude amplification, offer quadratic speedup in solving various important scientific problems, their exponential time complexity limits scalability as the quantum circuit depths grow exponentially with the number of qubits. To overcome this challenge, we propose Variational Quantum Search (VQS), a novel algorithm based on variational quantum algorithms and parameterized quantum circuits. We show that a depth-10 Ansatz can amplify the total probability of $k$ ($k \geq 1$) good elements, out of $2^n$ elements represented by $n$+1 qubits, from $k/2^n$ to nearly 1, as verified for $n$ up to 26, and that the maximum depth of quantum circuits in the VQS increases linearly with the number of qubits. Our experimental results have validated the efficacy of VQS and its exponential advantage over Grover's algorithm in circuit depth for up to 26 qubits. We demonstrate that a depth-56 circuit in VQS can replace a depth-270,989 circuit in Grover's algorithm. Envisioning its potential, VQS holds promise to accelerate solutions to critical problems.
We investigate the equational theory of Kleene algebra terms with variable complements -- (language) complement where it applies only to variables -- w.r.t. languages. While the equational theory w.r.t. languages coincides with the language equivalence (under the standard language valuation) for Kleene algebra terms, this coincidence is broken if we extend the terms with complements. In this paper, we prove the decidability of some fragments of the equational theory: the universality problem is coNP-complete, and the inequational theory t <= s is coNP-complete when t does not contain Kleene-star. To this end, we introduce words-to-letters valuations; they are sufficient valuations for the equational theory and ease us in investigating the equational theory w.r.t. languages. Additionally, we prove that for words with variable complements, the equational theory coincides with the word equivalence.
Delay alignment modulation (DAM) is an emerging technique for achieving inter-symbol interference (ISI)-free wideband communications using spatial-delay processing, without relying on channel equalization or multi-carrier transmission. However, existing works on DAM only consider multiple-input single-output (MISO) communication systems and assume time-invariant channels. In this paper, by extending DAM to time-variant frequency-selective multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) channels, we propose a novel technique termed \emph{delay-Doppler alignment modulation} (DDAM). Specifically, by leveraging \emph{delay-Doppler compensation} and \emph{path-based beamforming}, the Doppler effect of each multi-path can be eliminated and all multi-path signal components may reach the receiver concurrently and constructively. We first show that by applying path-based zero-forcing (ZF) precoding and receive combining, DDAM can transform the original time-variant frequency-selective channels into time-invariant ISI-free channels. The necessary and/or sufficient conditions to achieve such a transformation are derived. Then an asymptotic analysis is provided by showing that when the number of base station (BS) antennas is much larger than that of channel paths, DDAM enables time-invariant ISI-free channels with the simple delay-Doppler compensation and path-based maximal-ratio transmission (MRT) beamforming. Furthermore, for the general DDAM design with some tolerable ISI, the path-based transmit precoding and receive combining matrices are optimized to maximize the spectral efficiency. Numerical results are provided to compare the proposed DDAM technique with various benchmarking schemes, including MIMO-orthogonal time frequency space (OTFS), MIMO-orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) without or with carrier frequency offset (CFO) compensation, and beam alignment along the dominant path.
We present a new, efficient procedure to establish Markov equivalence between directed graphs that may or may not contain cycles under the \textit{d}-separation criterion. It is based on the Cyclic Equivalence Theorem (CET) in the seminal works on cyclic models by Thomas Richardson in the mid '90s, but now rephrased from an ancestral perspective. The resulting characterization leads to a procedure for establishing Markov equivalence between graphs that no longer requires tests for d-separation, leading to a significantly reduced algorithmic complexity. The conceptually simplified characterization may help to reinvigorate theoretical research towards sound and complete cyclic discovery in the presence of latent confounders. This version includes a correction to rule (iv) in Theorem 1, and the subsequent adjustment in part 2 of Algorithm 2.
The existence of representative datasets is a prerequisite of many successful artificial intelligence and machine learning models. However, the subsequent application of these models often involves scenarios that are inadequately represented in the data used for training. The reasons for this are manifold and range from time and cost constraints to ethical considerations. As a consequence, the reliable use of these models, especially in safety-critical applications, is a huge challenge. Leveraging additional, already existing sources of knowledge is key to overcome the limitations of purely data-driven approaches, and eventually to increase the generalization capability of these models. Furthermore, predictions that conform with knowledge are crucial for making trustworthy and safe decisions even in underrepresented scenarios. This work provides an overview of existing techniques and methods in the literature that combine data-based models with existing knowledge. The identified approaches are structured according to the categories integration, extraction and conformity. Special attention is given to applications in the field of autonomous driving.
Translational distance-based knowledge graph embedding has shown progressive improvements on the link prediction task, from TransE to the latest state-of-the-art RotatE. However, N-1, 1-N and N-N predictions still remain challenging. In this work, we propose a novel translational distance-based approach for knowledge graph link prediction. The proposed method includes two-folds, first we extend the RotatE from 2D complex domain to high dimension space with orthogonal transforms to model relations for better modeling capacity. Second, the graph context is explicitly modeled via two directed context representations. These context representations are used as part of the distance scoring function to measure the plausibility of the triples during training and inference. The proposed approach effectively improves prediction accuracy on the difficult N-1, 1-N and N-N cases for knowledge graph link prediction task. The experimental results show that it achieves better performance on two benchmark data sets compared to the baseline RotatE, especially on data set (FB15k-237) with many high in-degree connection nodes.
Named entity recognition (NER) is the task to identify text spans that mention named entities, and to classify them into predefined categories such as person, location, organization etc. NER serves as the basis for a variety of natural language applications such as question answering, text summarization, and machine translation. Although early NER systems are successful in producing decent recognition accuracy, they often require much human effort in carefully designing rules or features. In recent years, deep learning, empowered by continuous real-valued vector representations and semantic composition through nonlinear processing, has been employed in NER systems, yielding stat-of-the-art performance. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive review on existing deep learning techniques for NER. We first introduce NER resources, including tagged NER corpora and off-the-shelf NER tools. Then, we systematically categorize existing works based on a taxonomy along three axes: distributed representations for input, context encoder, and tag decoder. Next, we survey the most representative methods for recent applied techniques of deep learning in new NER problem settings and applications. Finally, we present readers with the challenges faced by NER systems and outline future directions in this area.
How can we estimate the importance of nodes in a knowledge graph (KG)? A KG is a multi-relational graph that has proven valuable for many tasks including question answering and semantic search. In this paper, we present GENI, a method for tackling the problem of estimating node importance in KGs, which enables several downstream applications such as item recommendation and resource allocation. While a number of approaches have been developed to address this problem for general graphs, they do not fully utilize information available in KGs, or lack flexibility needed to model complex relationship between entities and their importance. To address these limitations, we explore supervised machine learning algorithms. In particular, building upon recent advancement of graph neural networks (GNNs), we develop GENI, a GNN-based method designed to deal with distinctive challenges involved with predicting node importance in KGs. Our method performs an aggregation of importance scores instead of aggregating node embeddings via predicate-aware attention mechanism and flexible centrality adjustment. In our evaluation of GENI and existing methods on predicting node importance in real-world KGs with different characteristics, GENI achieves 5-17% higher NDCG@100 than the state of the art.
We introduce a generic framework that reduces the computational cost of object detection while retaining accuracy for scenarios where objects with varied sizes appear in high resolution images. Detection progresses in a coarse-to-fine manner, first on a down-sampled version of the image and then on a sequence of higher resolution regions identified as likely to improve the detection accuracy. Built upon reinforcement learning, our approach consists of a model (R-net) that uses coarse detection results to predict the potential accuracy gain for analyzing a region at a higher resolution and another model (Q-net) that sequentially selects regions to zoom in. Experiments on the Caltech Pedestrians dataset show that our approach reduces the number of processed pixels by over 50% without a drop in detection accuracy. The merits of our approach become more significant on a high resolution test set collected from YFCC100M dataset, where our approach maintains high detection performance while reducing the number of processed pixels by about 70% and the detection time by over 50%.