Solution to reinforcement learning problems with artificial potential field

A novel method was designed to solve reinforcement learning problems with artificial potential field.Firstly a reinforcement learning problem was transferred to a path planning problem by using artificial potential field(APF),which was a very appropriate method to model a reinforcement learning problem.Secondly,a new APF algorithm was proposed to overcome the local minimum problem in the potential field methods with a virtual water-flow concept.The performance of this new method was tested by a gridworld problem named as key and door maze.The experimental results show that within 45 trials,good and deterministic policies are found in almost all simulations.In comparison with WIERING's HQ-learning system which needs 20 000 trials for stable solution,the proposed new method can obtain optimal and stable policy far more quickly than HQ-learning.Therefore,the new method is simple and effective to give an optimal solution to the reinforcement learning problem.