The Job Shop Scheduling Problem (JSSP) is a complex combinatorial optimization problem. There has been growing interest in using online Reinforcement Learning (RL) for JSSP. While online RL can quickly find acceptable solutions, especially for larger problems, it produces lower-quality results than traditional methods like Constraint Programming (CP). A significant downside of online RL is that it cannot learn from existing data, such as solutions generated from CP, requiring them to train from scratch, leading to sample inefficiency and making them unable to learn from more optimal examples. We introduce Offline Reinforcement Learning for Learning to Dispatch (Offline-LD), a novel approach for JSSP that addresses these limitations. Offline-LD adapts two CQL-based Q-learning methods (mQRDQN and discrete mSAC) for maskable action spaces, introduces a new entropy bonus modification for discrete SAC, and exploits reward normalization through preprocessing. Our experiments show that Offline-LD outperforms online RL on both generated and benchmark instances. By introducing noise into the dataset, we achieve similar or better results than those obtained from the expert dataset, indicating that a more diverse training set is preferable because it contains counterfactual information.

In this work, we introduce a new approach to processing complex-valued data using DNNs consisting of parallel real-valued subnetworks with coupled outputs. Our proposed class of architectures, referred to as Steinmetz Neural Networks, leverages multi-view learning to construct more interpretable representations within the latent space. Subsequently, we present the Analytic Neural Network, which implements a consistency penalty that encourages analytic signal representations in the Steinmetz neural network's latent space. This penalty enforces a deterministic and orthogonal relationship between the real and imaginary components. Utilizing an information-theoretic construction, we demonstrate that the upper bound on the generalization error posited by the analytic neural network is lower than that of the general class of Steinmetz neural networks. Our numerical experiments demonstrate the improved performance and robustness to additive noise, afforded by our proposed networks on benchmark datasets and synthetic examples.

This paper provides a comprehensive survey of sentiment analysis within the context of artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLMs). Sentiment analysis, a critical aspect of natural language processing (NLP), has evolved significantly from traditional rule-based methods to advanced deep learning techniques. This study examines the historical development of sentiment analysis, highlighting the transition from lexicon-based and pattern-based approaches to more sophisticated machine learning and deep learning models. Key challenges are discussed, including handling bilingual texts, detecting sarcasm, and addressing biases. The paper reviews state-of-the-art approaches, identifies emerging trends, and outlines future research directions to advance the field. By synthesizing current methodologies and exploring future opportunities, this survey aims to understand sentiment analysis in the AI and LLM context thoroughly.

Deep learning provides powerful methods to impute structured information from large-scale, unstructured text and image datasets. For example, economists might wish to detect the presence of economic activity in satellite images, or to measure the topics or entities mentioned in social media, the congressional record, or firm filings. This review introduces deep neural networks, covering methods such as classifiers, regression models, generative AI, and embedding models. Applications include classification, document digitization, record linkage, and methods for data exploration in massive scale text and image corpora. When suitable methods are used, deep learning models can be cheap to tune and can scale affordably to problems involving millions or billions of data points.. The review is accompanied by a companion website, EconDL, with user-friendly demo notebooks, software resources, and a knowledge base that provides technical details and additional applications.

This literature review surveys the advancements of keyword spotting (KWS) technologies, specifically focusing on Urdu, Pakistan's low-resource language (LRL), which has complex phonetics. Despite the global strides in speech technology, Urdu presents unique challenges requiring more tailored solutions. The review traces the evolution from foundational Gaussian Mixture Models to sophisticated neural architectures like deep neural networks and transformers, highlighting significant milestones such as integrating multi-task learning and self-supervised approaches that leverage unlabeled data. It examines emerging technologies' role in enhancing KWS systems' performance within multilingual and resource-constrained settings, emphasizing the need for innovations that cater to languages like Urdu. Thus, this review underscores the need for context-specific research addressing the inherent complexities of Urdu and similar URLs and the means of regions communicating through such languages for a more inclusive approach to speech technology.

TREB, a novel tabular imputation framework utilizing BERT, introduces a groundbreaking approach for handling missing values in tabular data. Unlike traditional methods that often overlook the specific demands of imputation, TREB leverages the robust capabilities of BERT to address this critical task. While many BERT-based approaches for tabular data have emerged, they frequently under-utilize the language model's full potential. To rectify this, TREB employs a BERT-based model fine-tuned specifically for the task of imputing real-valued continuous numbers in tabular datasets. The paper comprehensively addresses the unique challenges posed by tabular data imputation, emphasizing the importance of context-based interconnections. The effectiveness of TREB is validated through rigorous evaluation using the California Housing dataset. The results demonstrate its ability to preserve feature interrelationships and accurately impute missing values. Moreover, the authors shed light on the computational efficiency and environmental impact of TREB, quantifying the floating-point operations (FLOPs) and carbon footprint associated with its training and deployment.

Recent advances in the field of machine learning have led to new ways for mobile robots to acquire advanced navigational capabilities. However, these learning-based methods raise the possibility that learned navigation behaviors may not align with the intentions and preferences of people, a problem known as value misalignment. To mitigate this risk, this dissertation aims to answer the question: "How can we use machine learning methods to align the navigational behaviors of autonomous mobile robots with human intentions and preferences?" First, this dissertation addresses this question by introducing a new approach to learning navigation behaviors by imitating human-provided demonstrations of the intended navigation task. This contribution allows mobile robots to acquire autonomous visual navigation capabilities through imitation, using a novel objective function that encourages the agent to align with the human's navigation objectives and penalizes misalignment. Second, this dissertation introduces two algorithms to enhance terrain-aware off-road navigation for mobile robots by learning visual terrain awareness in a self-supervised manner. This contribution enables mobile robots to respect a human operator's preferences for navigating different terrains in urban outdoor environments, while extrapolating these preferences to visually novel terrains by leveraging multi-modal representations. Finally, in the context of robot navigation in human-occupied environments, this dissertation introduces a dataset and an algorithm for robot navigation in a socially compliant manner in both indoor and outdoor environments. In summary, the contributions in this dissertation take significant steps toward addressing the value alignment problem in autonomous navigation, enabling mobile robots to navigate autonomously with objectives that align with human intentions and preferences.

Teleoperation is an important technology to enable supervisors to control agricultural robots remotely. However, environmental factors in dense crop rows and limitations in network infrastructure hinder the reliability of data streamed to teleoperators. These issues result in delayed and variable frame rate video feeds that often deviate significantly from the robot's actual viewpoint. We propose a modular learning-based vision pipeline to generate delay-compensated images in real-time for supervisors. Our extensive offline evaluations demonstrate that our method generates more accurate images compared to state-of-the-art approaches in our setting. Additionally, we are one of the few works to evaluate a delay-compensation method in outdoor field environments with complex terrain on data from a real robot in real-time. Additional videos are provided at https://sites.google.com/illinois.edu/comp-teleop.

Along with the rapid growth of autonomous vehicles (AVs), more and more demands are required for environment perception technology. Among others, HD mapping has become one of the more prominent roles in helping the vehicle realize essential tasks such as localization and path planning. While increasing research efforts have been directed toward HD Map development. However, a comprehensive overview of the overall HD map mapping and update framework is still lacking. This article introduces the development and current state of the algorithm involved in creating HD map mapping and its maintenance. As part of this study, the primary data preprocessing approach of processing raw data to information ready to feed for mapping and update purposes, semantic segmentation, and localization are also briefly reviewed. Moreover, the map taxonomy, ontology, and quality assessment are extensively discussed, the map data's general representation method is presented, and the mapping algorithm ranging from SLAM to transformers learning-based approaches are also discussed. The development of the HD map update algorithm, from change detection to the update methods, is also presented. Finally, the authors discuss possible future developments and the remaining challenges in HD map mapping and update technology. This paper simultaneously serves as a position paper and tutorial to those new to HD map mapping and update domains.

Recent advancements in deep learning, particularly large language models (LLMs), made a significant impact on how researchers study microbiome and metagenomics data. Microbial protein and genomic sequences, like natural languages, form a language of life, enabling the adoption of LLMs to extract useful insights from complex microbial ecologies. In this paper, we review applications of deep learning and language models in analyzing microbiome and metagenomics data. We focus on problem formulations, necessary datasets, and the integration of language modeling techniques. We provide an extensive overview of protein/genomic language modeling and their contributions to microbiome studies. We also discuss applications such as novel viromics language modeling, biosynthetic gene cluster prediction, and knowledge integration for metagenomics studies.