Bayesian Optimization Under Uncertainty for Chance Constrained Problems
Abstract
Chance constraint is an important tool for modeling the reliability on decision making in the
presence of uncertainties. Indeed, the chance constraint enforces that the constraint is satisfied
with probability
1
−
α
(
0
< α <
1
) at least. In addition, we consider that the objective func-
tion is affected by uncertainties. This problem is challenging since modeling a complex system
under uncertainty can be expensive and for most real-world stochastic optimization will not be
computationally viable.
In this talk, we propose a Bayesian methodology to efficiently solve such class of problems.
The central idea is to use Gaussian Process (GP) models [1] together with appropriate acquisi-
tion functions to guide the search for an optimal solution. We first show that by specifying a
GP prior to the objective function, the loss function becomes tractable [2]. Similarly, using GP
models for the constraints, the probability satisfaction can be efficiently approximated. Sub-
sequently, we introduce new acquisition functions to iteratively select the points to query the
expensive objective and constraint functions. Finally, we present numerical examples to validate
our approach compared to benchmark results.