Mirror descent for constrained stochastic control problems

Abstract: Mirror descent is a well established tool for solving convex optimization problems with convex constraints. This article introduces continuous-time mirror descent dynamics for approximating optimal Markov controls for stochastic control problems with the action space being bounded and convex. We show that if the Hamiltonian is uniformly convex in its action variable then mirror descent converges linearly while if it is uniformly strongly convex relative to an appropriate Bregman divergence, then the mirror flow converges exponentially. The two fundamental difficulties that must be overcome to prove such results are: first, the inherent lack of convexity of the map from Markov controls to the corresponding value function. Second, maintaining sufficient regularity of the value function and the Markov controls along the mirror descent updates. The first issue is handled using the performance difference lemma, while the second using careful Sobolev space estimates for the solutions of the associated linear PDEs.