Parallel Implementation of Swarm Intelligent Algorithms in a Spark-Based Cloud Computing Environment

Author(s):  
Jun Zhu ◽  
Yushen Wang

Swarm intelligent algorithms can effectively tackle optimization problems that are difficult to solve by using traditional optimization algorithms. However, with the huge increase in the time and space cost for solving optimization problems, the use of swarm intelligent algorithms suffer from the limitation of overly long computation time. Based on Spark, which is the most popular open-source distributed computing framework, this paper studies specifically using swarm intelligent algorithms to solve combinatorial optimization problems. Based on the characteristics of typical swarm intelligent algorithms, we develop Spark-based parallel implementation of these algorithms to accelerate the population updating and parameter tuning procedures involved in swarm intelligence. Specifically, we first initialize the swarm and generate the initial solution, then perform the distributed iterative evolution procedure, and finally obtain the optimal solution. In addition, in order to improve solution quality, we rely on the Spark platform to perform distributed parameter tuning. The tuning strategy first generates different parameter combinations according to a given parameter list, then execute swarm intelligent algorithms with different parameter combinations in a distributed and parallel manner, and finally determine the optimal parameter combination by comparing the solutions of all algorithms. Experimental results on benchmark datasets show that the distributed algorithms can significantly enhance the computational efficiency without affecting the solution quality.

2011 ◽  
Vol 421 ◽  
pp. 559-563
Author(s):  
Yong Chao Gao ◽  
Li Mei Liu ◽  
Heng Qian ◽  
Ding Wang

The scale and complexity of search space are important factors deciding the solving difficulty of an optimization problem. The information of solution space may lead searching to optimal solutions. Based on this, an algorithm for combinatorial optimization is proposed. This algorithm makes use of the good solutions found by intelligent algorithms, contracts the search space and partitions it into one or several optimal regions by backbones of combinatorial optimization solutions. And optimization of small-scale problems is carried out in optimal regions. Statistical analysis is not necessary before or through the solving process in this algorithm, and solution information is used to estimate the landscape of search space, which enhances the speed of solving and solution quality. The algorithm breaks a new path for solving combinatorial optimization problems, and the results of experiments also testify its efficiency.


Author(s):  
Arslan Ali Syed ◽  
Irina Gaponova ◽  
Klaus Bogenberger

The majority of transportation problems include optimizing some sort of cost function. These optimization problems are often NP-hard and have an exponential increase in computation time with the increase in the model size. The problem of matching vehicles to passenger requests in ride hailing (RH) contexts typically falls into this category.Metaheuristics are often utilized for such problems with the aim of finding a global optimal solution. However, such algorithms usually include lots of parameters that need to be tuned to obtain a good performance. Typically multiple simulations are run on diverse small size problems and the parameters values that perform the best on average are chosen for subsequent larger simulations.In contrast to the above approach, we propose training a neural network to predict the parameter values that work the best for an instance of the given problem. We show that various features, based on the problem instance and shareability graph statistics, can be used to predict the solution quality of a matching problem in RH services. Consequently, the values corresponding to the best predicted solution can be selected for the actual problem. We study the effectiveness of above described approach for the static assignment of vehicles to passengers in RH services. We utilized the DriveNow data from Bavarian Motor Works (BMW) for generating passenger requests inside Munich, and for the metaheuristic, we used a large neighborhood search (LNS) algorithm combined with a shareability graph.


2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (03) ◽  
pp. 2335-2342
Author(s):  
Nawal Benabbou ◽  
Cassandre Leroy ◽  
Thibaut Lust

We propose a new approach consisting in combining genetic algorithms and regret-based incremental preference elicitation for solving multi-objective combinatorial optimization problems with unknown preferences. For the purpose of elicitation, we assume that the decision maker's preferences can be represented by a parameterized scalarizing function but the parameters are initially not known. Instead, the parameter imprecision is progressively reduced by asking preference queries to the decision maker during the search to help identify the best solutions within a population. Our algorithm, called RIGA, can be applied to any multi-objective combinatorial optimization problem provided that the scalarizing function is linear in its parameters and that a (near-)optimal solution can be efficiently determined when preferences are known. Moreover, RIGA runs in polynomial time while asking no more than a polynomial number of queries. For the multi-objective traveling salesman problem, we provide numerical results showing its practical efficiency in terms of number of queries, computation time and gap to optimality.


Author(s):  
Minghe Sun

Optimization problems with multiple criteria measuring solution quality can be modeled as multiobjective programming problems. Because the objective functions are usually in conflict, there is not a single feasible solution that can optimize all objective functions simultaneously. An optimal solution is one that is most preferred by the decision maker (DM) among all feasible solutions. An optimal solution must be nondominated but a multiobjective programming problem may have, possibly infinitely, many nondominated solutions. Therefore, tradeoffs must be made in searching for an optimal solution. Hence, the DM's preference information is elicited and used when a multiobjective programming problem is solved. The model, concepts and definitions of multiobjective programming are presented and solution methods are briefly discussed. Examples are used to demonstrate the concepts and solution methods. Graphics are used in these examples to facilitate understanding.


2014 ◽  
Vol 591 ◽  
pp. 172-175
Author(s):  
M. Chandrasekaran ◽  
P. Sriramya ◽  
B. Parvathavarthini ◽  
M. Saravanamanikandan

In modern years, there has been growing importance in the design, analysis and to resolve extremely complex problems. Because of the complexity of problem variants and the difficult nature of the problems they deal with, it is arguably impracticable in the majority time to build appropriate guarantees about the number of fitness evaluations needed for an algorithm to and an optimal solution. In such situations, heuristic algorithms can solve approximate solutions; however suitable time and space complication take part an important role. In present, all recognized algorithms for NP-complete problems are requiring time that's exponential within the problem size. The acknowledged NP-hardness results imply that for several combinatorial optimization problems there are no efficient algorithms that realize a best resolution, or maybe a close to best resolution, on each instance. The study Computational Complexity Analysis of Selective Breeding algorithm involves both an algorithmic issue and a theoretical challenge and the excellence of a heuristic.


2004 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 327-353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shawki Areibi ◽  
Zhen Yang

Combining global and local search is a strategy used by many successful hybrid optimization approaches. Memetic Algorithms (MAs) are Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs) that apply some sort of local search to further improve the fitness of individuals in the population. Memetic Algorithms have been shown to be very effective in solving many hard combinatorial optimization problems. This paper provides a forum for identifying and exploring the key issues that affect the design and application of Memetic Algorithms. The approach combines a hierarchical design technique, Genetic Algorithms, constructive techniques and advanced local search to solve VLSI circuit layout in the form of circuit partitioning and placement. Results obtained indicate that Memetic Algorithms based on local search, clustering and good initial solutions improve solution quality on average by 35% for the VLSI circuit partitioning problem and 54% for the VLSI standard cell placement problem.


Author(s):  
Murad Yahya Nassar ◽  
Mohd Noor Abdullah ◽  
Asif Ahmed Rahimoon

Economic dispatch (ED) is the power demand allocating process for the committed units at minimum generation cost while satisfying system and operational constraints. Increasing cost of fuel price and electricity demand can increase the cost of thermal power generation. Therefore, robust and efficient optimization algorithm is required to determine the optimal solution for ED problem in power system operation and planning. In this paper the lightning search algorithm (LSA) is proposed to solve the ED problem. The system constraints such as power balance, generator limits, system transmission losses and valve-points effects (VPE) are considered in this paper. To verify the effectiveness of LSA in terms of convergence characteristic, robustness, simulation time and solution quality, the two case studies consists of 6 and 13 units have been tested. The simulation results show that the LSA can provide optimal cost than many methods reported in literature. Therefore, it has potential to solve many optimization problems in power dispatch and power system applications.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oluvaseun Owojaiye

Advancement in technology has brought considerable improvement to processor design and now manufacturers design multiple processors on a single chip. Supercomputers today consists of cluster of interconnected nodes that collaborate together to solve complex and advanced computation problems. Message Passing Interface and Open Multiprocessing are the popularly used programming models to optimize sequential codes by parallelizing them on the different multiprocessor architecture that exist today. In this thesis, we parallelize the non-slicing floorplan algorithm based on Multilevel Floorplanning/placement of large scale modules using B*tree (MB*tree) with MPI and OpenMP on distributed and shared memory architectures respectively. In VLSI (Very Large Scale Integration) design automation, floorplanning is an initial and vital task performed in the early design stage. Experimental results using MCNC benchmark circuits show that our parallel algorithm produced better results than the corresponding sequential algorithm; we were able to speed up the algorithm up to 4 times, hence reducing computation time and maintaining floorplan solution quality. On the other hand, we compared both parallel versions; and the OpenMP results gave slightly better than the corresponding MPI results.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document