Abstract
This paper investigates search techniques for multi-agent settings in which the most suitable agent, according to given criteria, needs to be found. In particular, it considers the case where the searching agent incurs a cost for learning the value of an agent and the goal is to minimize the expected overall cost of search by iteratively increasing the extent of search. This kind of search is applicable to various domains, including auctions, first responders, and sensor networks. Using an innovative transformation of the extents-based sequence to a probability-based one, the optimal sequence is proved to consist of either a single search iteration or an infinite sequence of increasing search extents. This leads to a simplified characterization of the the optimal search sequence from which it can be derived. This method is also highly useful for legacy economic-search applications, where all agents are considered suitable candidates and the goal is to optimize the search process as a whole. The effectiveness of the method for both best-valued search and economic search is demonstrated numerically using a synthetic environment.
| Original language | English |
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| Title of host publication | AAAI-10 / IAAI-10 - Proceedings of the 24th AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and the 22nd Innovative Applications of Artificial Intelligence Conference |
| Publisher | AI Access Foundation |
| Pages | 848-853 |
| Number of pages | 6 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781577354659 |
| State | Published - 2010 |
| Event | 24th AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and the 22nd Innovative Applications of Artificial Intelligence Conference, AAAI-10 / IAAI-10 - Atlanta, GA, United States Duration: 11 Jul 2010 → 15 Jul 2010 |
Publication series
| Name | Proceedings of the National Conference on Artificial Intelligence |
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| Volume | 2 |
Conference
| Conference | 24th AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence and the 22nd Innovative Applications of Artificial Intelligence Conference, AAAI-10 / IAAI-10 |
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| Country/Territory | United States |
| City | Atlanta, GA |
| Period | 11/07/10 → 15/07/10 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:We are grateful to Dick Bond, Robert Brandenberger, Brendan Crill, Robert Crittenden, Khurram Farooqui, Josh Gundersen, Wayne Hu, Kip Hyatt, Lloyd Knox, Arthur Kosowsky, Andrew Lange, Phil Lubin, Melvin Phua, Alex Polnarev, Dan Swetz, David Wilkinson, Grant Wilson, Ed Wollack, and Matias Zal-darriaga for many useful conversations. B. G. K. and C. W. O. were supported by NASA GSRP Fellowships. POLAR’s HEMT amplifiers were graciously provided by John Carlstrom. This work has been supported by NSF grants AST 93-18727, AST 98-02851, and AST 00-71213 and NASA grant NAG5-9194.
Funding
This work was supported in part by the Israeli Ministry of Industry and Trade under project RESCUE and ISF/BSF grants 1401/09 and 2008-404 . We would like to especially thank Jeremy Schiff of the Bar Ilan University math department for his assistance with the proof of Theorem 2 . Finally, we would like to thank the three anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions to improve this paper.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| ISF/BSF | 2008-404, 1401/09 |
| Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry |