Bounds for Synchronizing Markov Decision Processes

Abstract

We consider Markov decision processes with synchronizing objectives, which require that a probability mass of $1-\epsilon$ accumulates in a designated set of target states, either once, always, infinitely often, or always from some point on, where $\epsilon = 0$ for sure synchronizing, and $\epsilon \to 0$ for almost-sure and limit-sure synchronizing. We introduce two new qualitative modes of synchronizing, where the probability mass should be either positive, or bounded away from $0$. They can be viewed as dual synchronizing objectives. We present algorithms and tight complexity results for the problem of deciding if a Markov decision process is positive, or bounded synchronizing, and we provide explicit bounds on $\epsilon$ in all synchronizing modes. In particular, we show that deciding positive and bounded synchronizing always from some point on, is coNP-complete.