Citation

Korecki M. Entropy (Basel) 2023; 25(7): e982.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2023, MDPI: Multidisciplinary Digital Publications Institute)

DOI

10.3390/e25070982

PMID

37509929

Abstract

We studied the ability of deep reinforcement learning and self-organizing approaches to adapt to dynamic complex systems, using the applied example of traffic signal control in a simulated urban environment. We highlight the general limitations of deep learning for control in complex systems, even when employing state-of-the-art meta-learning methods, and contrast it with self-organization-based methods. Accordingly, we argue that complex systems are a good and challenging study environment for developing and improving meta-learning approaches. At the same time, we point to the importance of baselines to which meta-learning methods can be compared and present a self-organizing analytic traffic signal control that outperforms state-of-the-art meta-learning in some scenarios. We also show that meta-learning methods outperform classical learning methods in our simulated environment (around 1.5-2× improvement, in most scenarios). Our conclusions are that, in order to develop effective meta-learning methods that are able to adapt to a variety of conditions, it is necessary to test them in demanding, complex settings (such as, for example, urban traffic control) and compare them against established methods.

Language: en

Keywords

complex systems; meta-learning; self-organization