Agents
Reviews: A Structured Prediction Approach for Generalization in Cooperative Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning
This paper proposes a new multi-task hierarchical reinforcement learning algorithm. The high-level policy achieves the assignment of tasks by solving a linear programming problem(or a quadratic programming problem), and the low-level policy is pre-defined. The biggest contribution of this paper is to get rid of the limitation of the number of agents and the number of tasks by modeling the multi-task assignment problem as an optimization problem, which based on the correlation between the agent and the task and the correlation between the tasks. After training the correlation in a simple task, you only need to re-solve the optimization problem in the complex task, without retraining, thus achieving zero-shot generalization. In this paper, the collaboration patterns between agents in the multi-task problem, such as creating subgroups of agents or spreading agents across tasks at the same time, are transformed into constraints to be added to the optimization problem corresponding to the high-level policy.
Review for NeurIPS paper: Influence-Augmented Online Planning for Complex Environments
Weaknesses: The major concern is that the idea of exploiting "influences" of domain variables to reduce the state space of POMDPs is not new. In the literature, those variables that only indirectly influence agent behaviors are referred to as exogenous variables. The following are two papers that studied this idea. The RNN-based influence learning is new within the literature, while the following two papers have studied other reasoning and learning methods to incorporate exogenous variables into POMDP-based action selection processes. Zhang S, Khandelwal P, Stone P. Dynamically constructed (PO) MDPs for adaptive robot planning.
Beyond the Sum: Unlocking AI Agents Potential Through Market Forces
Sanabria, Jordi Montes, Vecino, Pol Alvarez
The emergence of Large Language Models has fundamentally transformed the capabilities of AI agents, enabling a new class of autonomous agents capable of interacting with their environment through dynamic code generation and execution. These agents possess the theoretical capacity to operate as independent economic actors within digital markets, offering unprecedented potential for value creation through their distinct advantages in operational continuity, perfect replication, and distributed learning capabilities. However, contemporary digital infrastructure, architected primarily for human interaction, presents significant barriers to their participation. This work presents a systematic analysis of the infrastructure requirements necessary for AI agents to function as autonomous participants in digital markets. We examine four key areas - identity and authorization, service discovery, interfaces, and payment systems - to show how existing infrastructure actively impedes agent participation. We argue that addressing these infrastructure challenges represents more than a technical imperative; it constitutes a fundamental step toward enabling new forms of economic organization. Much as traditional markets enable human intelligence to coordinate complex activities beyond individual capability, markets incorporating AI agents could dramatically enhance economic efficiency through continuous operation, perfect information sharing, and rapid adaptation to changing conditions. The infrastructure challenges identified in this work represent key barriers to realizing this potential.
Top Ten Challenges Towards Agentic Neural Graph Databases
Bai, Jiaxin, Wang, Zihao, Zhou, Yukun, Yin, Hang, Fei, Weizhi, Hu, Qi, Deng, Zheye, Cheng, Jiayang, Zheng, Tianshi, Tsang, Hong Ting, Gao, Yisen, Xie, Zhongwei, Li, Yufei, Fan, Lixin, Yuan, Binhang, Wang, Wei, Chen, Lei, Zhou, Xiaofang, Song, Yangqiu
Graph databases (GDBs) like Neo4j and TigerGraph excel at handling interconnected data but lack advanced inference capabilities. Neural Graph Databases (NGDBs) address this by integrating Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) for predictive analysis and reasoning over incomplete or noisy data. However, NGDBs rely on predefined queries and lack autonomy and adaptability. This paper introduces Agentic Neural Graph Databases (Agentic NGDBs), which extend NGDBs with three core functionalities: autonomous query construction, neural query execution, and continuous learning. We identify ten key challenges in realizing Agentic NGDBs: semantic unit representation, abductive reasoning, scalable query execution, and integration with foundation models like large language models (LLMs). By addressing these challenges, Agentic NGDBs can enable intelligent, self-improving systems for modern data-driven applications, paving the way for adaptable and autonomous data management solutions.
WFCRL: A Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning Benchmark for Wind Farm Control
Monroc, Claire Bizon, Buลกiฤ, Ana, Dubuc, Donatien, Zhu, Jiamin
The wind farm control problem is challenging, since conventional model-based control strategies require tractable models of complex aerodynamical interactions between the turbines and suffer from the curse of dimension when the number of turbines increases. Recently, model-free and multi-agent reinforcement learning approaches have been used to address this challenge. In this article, we introduce WFCRL (Wind Farm Control with Reinforcement Learning), the first open suite of multi-agent reinforcement learning environments for the wind farm control problem. WFCRL frames a cooperative Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning (MARL) problem: each turbine is an agent and can learn to adjust its yaw, pitch or torque to maximize the common objective (e.g. the total power production of the farm). WFCRL also offers turbine load observations that will allow to optimize the farm performance while limiting turbine structural damages. Interfaces with two state-of-the-art farm simulators are implemented in WFCRL: a static simulator (FLORIS) and a dynamic simulator (FAST.Farm). For each simulator, $10$ wind layouts are provided, including $5$ real wind farms. Two state-of-the-art online MARL algorithms are implemented to illustrate the scaling challenges. As learning online on FAST.Farm is highly time-consuming, WFCRL offers the possibility of designing transfer learning strategies from FLORIS to FAST.Farm.
Knowledge-Informed Multi-Agent Trajectory Prediction at Signalized Intersections for Infrastructure-to-Everything
Yin, Huilin, Xu, Yangwenhui, Li, Jiaxiang, Zhang, Hao, Rigoll, Gerhard
Multi-agent trajectory prediction at signalized intersections is crucial for developing efficient intelligent transportation systems and safe autonomous driving systems. Due to the complexity of intersection scenarios and the limitations of single-vehicle perception, the performance of vehicle-centric prediction methods has reached a plateau. Furthermore, most works underutilize critical intersection information, including traffic signals, and behavior patterns induced by road structures. Therefore, we propose a multi-agent trajectory prediction framework at signalized intersections dedicated to Infrastructure-to-Everything (I2XTraj). Our framework leverages dynamic graph attention to integrate knowledge from traffic signals and driving behaviors. A continuous signal-informed mechanism is proposed to adaptively process real-time traffic signals from infrastructure devices. Additionally, leveraging the prior knowledge of the intersection topology, we propose a driving strategy awareness mechanism to model the joint distribution of goal intentions and maneuvers. To the best of our knowledge, I2XTraj represents the first multi-agent trajectory prediction framework explicitly designed for infrastructure deployment, supplying subscribable prediction services to all vehicles at intersections. I2XTraj demonstrates state-of-the-art performance on both the Vehicle-to-Infrastructure dataset V2X-Seq and the aerial-view dataset SinD for signalized intersections. Quantitative evaluations show that our approach outperforms existing methods by more than 30% in both multi-agent and single-agent scenarios.
A Polynomial-Time Algorithm for EFX Orientations of Chores
This paper addresses the problem of finding EFX orientations of graphs of chores, in which each vertex corresponds to an agent, each edge corresponds to a chore, and a chore has zero marginal utility to an agent if its corresponding edge is not incident to the vertex corresponding to the agent. Recently, Zhou~et~al.~(IJCAI,~2024) analyzed the complexity of deciding whether graphs containing a mixture of goods and chores admit EFX orientations, and conjectured that deciding whether graphs containing only chores admit EFX orientations is NP-complete. In this paper, we resolve this conjecture by exhibiting a polynomial-time algorithm that finds an EFX orientation of a graph containing only chores if one exists, even if the graph contains self-loops. Remarkably, our first result demonstrates a surprising separation between the case of goods and the case of chores, because deciding whether graphs containing only goods admit EFX orientations of goods was shown to be NP-complete by Christodoulou et al.~(EC,~2023). In addition, we show the analogous decision problem for multigraphs to be NP-complete.
Distributed Multi-Agent Coordination Using Multi-Modal Foundation Models
Mahmud, Saaduddin, Goldfajn, Dorian Benhamou, Zilberstein, Shlomo
Distributed Constraint Optimization Problems (DCOPs) offer a powerful framework for multi-agent coordination but often rely on labor-intensive, manual problem construction. To address this, we introduce VL-DCOPs, a framework that takes advantage of large multimodal foundation models (LFMs) to automatically generate constraints from both visual and linguistic instructions. We then introduce a spectrum of agent archetypes for solving VL-DCOPs: from a neuro-symbolic agent that delegates some of the algorithmic decisions to an LFM, to a fully neural agent that depends entirely on an LFM for coordination. We evaluate these agent archetypes using state-of-the-art LLMs (large language models) and VLMs (vision language models) on three novel VL-DCOP tasks and compare their respective advantages and drawbacks. Lastly, we discuss how this work extends to broader frontier challenges in the DCOP literature.
Learning in Conjectural Stackelberg Games
Morri, Francesco, Cadre, Hรฉlรจne Le, Brotcorne, Luce
We extend the formalism of Conjectural Variations games to Stackelberg games involving multiple leaders and a single follower. To solve these nonconvex games, a common assumption is that the leaders compute their strategies having perfect knowledge of the follower's best response. However, in practice, the leaders may have little to no knowledge about the other players' reactions. To deal with this lack of knowledge, we assume that each leader can form conjectures about the other players' best responses, and update its strategy relying on these conjectures. Our contributions are twofold: (i) On the theoretical side, we introduce the concept of Conjectural Stackelberg Equilibrium -- keeping our formalism conjecture agnostic -- with Stackelberg Equilibrium being a refinement of it. (ii) On the algorithmic side, we introduce a two-stage algorithm with guarantees of convergence, which allows the leaders to first learn conjectures on a training data set, and then update their strategies. Theoretical results are illustrated numerically.
BMG-Q: Localized Bipartite Match Graph Attention Q-Learning for Ride-Pooling Order Dispatch
Hu, Yulong, Feng, Siyuan, Li, Sen
This paper introduces Localized Bipartite Match Graph Attention Q-Learning (BMG-Q), a novel Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning (MARL) algorithm framework tailored for ride-pooling order dispatch. BMG-Q advances ride-pooling decision-making process with the localized bipartite match graph underlying the Markov Decision Process, enabling the development of novel Graph Attention Double Deep Q Network (GATDDQN) as the MARL backbone to capture the dynamic interactions among ride-pooling vehicles in fleet. Our approach enriches the state information for each agent with GATDDQN by leveraging a localized bipartite interdependence graph and enables a centralized global coordinator to optimize order matching and agent behavior using Integer Linear Programming (ILP). Enhanced by gradient clipping and localized graph sampling, our GATDDQN improves scalability and robustness. Furthermore, the inclusion of a posterior score function in the ILP captures the online exploration-exploitation trade-off and reduces the potential overestimation bias of agents, thereby elevating the quality of the derived solutions. Through extensive experiments and validation, BMG-Q has demonstrated superior performance in both training and operations for thousands of vehicle agents, outperforming benchmark reinforcement learning frameworks by around 10% in accumulative rewards and showing a significant reduction in overestimation bias by over 50%. Additionally, it maintains robustness amidst task variations and fleet size changes, establishing BMG-Q as an effective, scalable, and robust framework for advancing ride-pooling order dispatch operations.