arXiv subjects

Max Cohen

Publications and source records attributed to Max Cohen.

10 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Chopping and distilling variational autoencoders for real-time anomaly detection in high energy physics

Anomaly detection (AD) has recently emerged as an exciting alternative to conventional search strategies in high energy physics using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). The integration of these techniques into trigger systems is even more recent, but represents a crucial step in expanding the coverage of LHC triggers. In this paper, we explore the direct comparison, as well as combination, of two compression techniques for variational autoencoder (VAE) AD trigger algorithms: utilizing only latent-space derived variables and therefore requiring only half of the VAE that we call "chopping" and applying knowledge distillation (KD) to distill the VAE into a student architecture that we call "distillation." We demonstrate the feasibility of deploying such techniques on an FPGA within the resource and latency constraints of an LHC trigger environment and further find that a combination of the two leads to the smallest models that maintain, and in some cases, improve, performance with respect to the original VAE architecture.

physics.ins-det↗

arXiv2023

Last layer state space model for representation learning and uncertainty quantification

As sequential neural architectures become deeper and more complex, uncertainty estimation is more and more challenging. Efforts in quantifying uncertainty often rely on specific training procedures, and bear additional computational costs due to the dimensionality of such models. In this paper, we propose to decompose a classification or regression task in two steps: a representation learning stage to learn low-dimensional states, and a state space model for uncertainty estimation. This approach allows to separate representation learning and design of generative models. We demonstrate how predictive distributions can be estimated on top of an existing and trained neural network, by adding a state space-based last layer whose parameters are estimated with Sequential Monte Carlo methods. We apply our proposed methodology to the hourly estimation of Electricity Transformer Oil temperature, a publicly benchmarked dataset. Our model accounts for the noisy data structure, due to unknown or unavailable variables, and is able to provide confidence intervals on predictions.

stat.ML↗

arXiv2023

Variational latent discrete representation for time series modelling

Discrete latent space models have recently achieved performance on par with their continuous counterparts in deep variational inference. While they still face various implementation challenges, these models offer the opportunity for a better interpretation of latent spaces, as well as a more direct representation of naturally discrete phenomena. Most recent approaches propose to train separately very high-dimensional prior models on the discrete latent data which is a challenging task on its own. In this paper, we introduce a latent data model where the discrete state is a Markov chain, which allows fast end-to-end training. The performance of our generative model is assessed on a building management dataset and on the publicly available Electricity Transformer Dataset.

stat.ML↗

arXiv2023

Modular Adaptive Safety-Critical Control

This paper presents an adaptive control approach for uncertain nonlinear systems subject to safety constraints that allows for modularity in the selection of the parameter estimation algorithm. Such modularity is achieved by unifying the concepts of input-to-state stability (ISS) and input-to-state safety (ISSf) via control Lyapunov functions (CLFs) and control barrier functions (CBFs), respectively. In particular, we propose a class of exponential ISS-CLFs and ISSf high order CBFs that can be combined with a general class of parameter estimation algorithms akin to those found in the literature on concurrent learning adaptive control. We demonstrate that the unification of ISS and ISSf in an adaptive control setting allows for maintaining a single set of parameter estimates for both the CLF and CBF that can be generated by a class of update laws satisfying a few general properties. The modularity of our approach is demonstrated via numerical examples by comparing performance in terms of stability and safety across different parameter estimation algorithms.

eess.SY↗

arXiv2022

Classical Analog of Quantum Models in Synthetic Dimensions

We introduce a classical analog of quantum matter in ultracold molecule -- or Rydberg atom -- synthetic dimensions, extending the Potts model to include interactions J1 between atoms adjacent in both real and synthetic space and studying its finite temperature properties. For intermediate values of J1, the resulting phases and phase diagrams are similar to those of the clock and Villain models, in which three phases emerge. There exists a sheet phase analogous to that found in quantum synthetic dimension models between the high temperature disordered phase and the low temperature ferromagnetic phase. We also employ machine learning to uncover non-trivial features of the phase diagram using the learning by confusion approach. The key result there is that the method is able to discern several successive phase transitions.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2022

Diffusion bridges vector quantized Variational AutoEncoders

Vector Quantized-Variational AutoEncoders (VQ-VAE) are generative models based on discrete latent representations of the data, where inputs are mapped to a finite set of learned embeddings.To generate new samples, an autoregressive prior distribution over the discrete states must be trained separately. This prior is generally very complex and leads to slow generation. In this work, we propose a new model to train the prior and the encoder/decoder networks simultaneously. We build a diffusion bridge between a continuous coded vector and a non-informative prior distribution. The latent discrete states are then given as random functions of these continuous vectors. We show that our model is competitive with the autoregressive prior on the mini-Imagenet and CIFAR dataset and is efficient in both optimization and sampling. Our framework also extends the standard VQ-VAE and enables end-to-end training.

stat.ML↗

arXiv2021

End-to-end deep meta modelling to calibrate and optimize energy consumption and comfort

In this paper, we propose a new end-to-end methodology to optimize the energy performance as well as comfort and air quality in large buildings without any renovation work. We introduce a metamodel based on recurrent neural networks and trained to predict the behavior of a general class of buildings using a database sampled from a simulation program. This metamodel is then deployed in different frameworks and its parameters are calibrated using the specific data of two real buildings. Parameters are estimated by comparing the predictions of the metamodel with real data obtained from sensors using the CMA-ES algorithm, a derivative free optimization procedure. Then, energy consumptions are optimized while maintaining a target thermal comfort and air quality, using the NSGA-II multi-objective optimization procedure. The numerical experiments illustrate how this metamodel ensures a significant gain in energy efficiency, up to almost 10%, while being computationally much more appealing than numerical models and flexible enough to be adapted to several types of buildings.

eess.SP↗

arXiv2021

Model-Based Reinforcement Learning for Approximate Optimal Control with Temporal Logic Specifications

In this paper we study the problem of synthesizing optimal control policies for uncertain continuous-time nonlinear systems from syntactically co-safe linear temporal logic (scLTL) formulas. We formulate this problem as a sequence of reach-avoid optimal control sub-problems. We show that the resulting hybrid optimal control policy guarantees the satisfaction of a given scLTL formula by constructing a barrier certificate. Since solving each optimal control problem may be computationally intractable, we take a learning-based approach to approximately solve this sequence of optimal control problems online without requiring full knowledge of the system dynamics. Using Lyapunov-based tools, we develop sufficient conditions under which our approximate solution maintains correctness. Finally, we demonstrate the efficacy of the developed method with a numerical example.

eess.SY↗

arXiv2020

Approximate Optimal Control for Safety-Critical Systems with Control Barrier Functions

Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) have become a popular tool for enforcing set invariance in safety-critical control systems. While guaranteeing safety, most CBF approaches are myopic in the sense that they solve an optimization problem at each time step rather than over a long time horizon. This approach may allow a system to get too close to the unsafe set where the optimization problem can become infeasible. Some of these issues can be mitigated by introducing relaxation variables into the optimization problem; however, this compromises convergence to the desired equilibrium point. To address these challenges, we develop an approximate optimal approach to the safety-critical control problem in which the cost of violating safety constraints is directly embedded within the value function. We show that our method is capable of guaranteeing both safety and convergence to a desired equilibrium. Finally, we compare the performance of our method with that of the traditional quadratic programming approach through numerical examples.

eess.SY↗

arXiv2020

End-to-end deep metamodeling to calibrate and optimize energy loads

In this paper, we propose a new end-to-end methodology to optimize the energy performance and the comfort, air quality and hygiene of large buildings. A metamodel based on a Transformer network is introduced and trained using a dataset sampled with a simulation program. Then, a few physical parameters and the building management system settings of this metamodel are calibrated using the CMA-ES optimization algorithm and real data obtained from sensors. Finally, the optimal settings to minimize the energy loads while maintaining a target thermal comfort and air quality are obtained using a multi-objective optimization procedure. The numerical experiments illustrate how this metamodel ensures a significant gain in energy efficiency while being computationally much more appealing than models requiring a huge number of physical parameters to be estimated.

eess.SP↗