Discrete cooperative particle swarm optimization for FPGA placement

Particle swarm optimization (PSO) is a stochastic optimization technique that has been inspired by the movement of birds. On the other hand, the placement problem in field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) is crucial to achieve the best performance. Simulated annealing algorithms have been widely used to solve the FPGA placement problem. In this paper, a discrete PSO (DPSO) version is applied to the FPGA placement problem to find the optimum logic blocks and IO pins locations in order to minimize the total wire-length. Moreover, a co-operative version of the DPSO (DCPSO) is also proposed for the FPGA placement problem. The problem is entirely solved in the discrete search space and the proposed implementation is applied to several well-known FPGA benchmarks with different dimensionalities. The results are compared to those obtained by the academic versatile place and route (VPR) placement tool, which is based on simulated annealing. Results show that both the DPSO and DCPSO outperform the VPR tool for small and medium-sized problems, with DCPSO having a slight edge over the DPSO technique. For higher-dimensionality problems, the algorithms proposed provide very close results to those achieved by VPR.     

Solving reliability redundancy allocation problems using an artificial bee colony algorithm

This paper proposed a penalty guided artificial bee colony algorithm (ABC) to solve the reliability redundancy allocation problem (RAP). The redundancy allocation problem involves setting reliability objectives for components or subsystems in order to meet the resource consumption constraint, e.g. the total cost. RAP has been an active area of research for the past four decades. The difficulty that one is confronted with the RAP is the maintenance of feasibility with respect to three nonlinear constraints, namely, cost, weight and volume related constraints. In this paper nonlinearly mixed-integer reliability design problems are investigated where both the number of redundancy components and the corresponding component reliability in each subsystem are to be decided simultaneously so as to maximize the reliability of the system. The reliability design problems have been studied in the literature for decades, usually using mathematical programming or heuristic optimization approaches. To the best of our knowledge the ABC algorithm can search over promising feasible and infeasible regions to find the feasible optimal/near-optimal solution effectively and efficiently; numerical examples indicate that the proposed approach performs well with the reliability redundant allocation design problems considered in this paper and computational results compare favorably with previously-developed algorithms in the literature.     

A bi-objective model to optimize reliability and cost of system with a choice of redundancy strategies

Reliability problems are an important type of optimization problems that are motivated by different needs of real-world applications such as telecommunication systems, transformation systems, and electrical systems, so on. This paper studies a special type of these problems which is called redundancy allocation problem (RAP) and develops a bi-objective RAP (BORAP). The model includes non-repairable series–parallel systems in which the redundancy strategy is considered as a decision variable for individual subsystems. The objective functions of the model are (1) maximizing system reliability and (2) minimizing the system cost. Meanwhile, subject to system-level constraint, the best redundancy strategy among active or cold-standby, component type, and the redundancy level for each subsystem should be determined. To have a more practical model, we have also considered non-constant component hazard functions and imperfect switching of cold-standby redundant component. To solve the model, since RAP belong to the NP-hard class of the optimization problems, two effective multi-objective metaheuristic algorithms named non-dominated sorting genetic algorithms (NSGA-II) and multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO) are proposed. Finally, the performance of the algorithms is analyzed on a typical case and conclusions are demonstrated.     

Fractional order fuzzy-PID control of a combined cycle power plant using Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm with an improved dynamic parameters selection

The effectiveness of the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm in solving any optimization problem is highly dependent on the right selection of tuning parameters. A better control parameter improves the flexibility and robustness of the algorithm. In this paper, a new PSO algorithm based on dynamic control parameters selection is presented in order to further enhance the algorithm's rate of convergence and the minimization of the fitness function. The powerful Dynamic PSO (DPSO) uses a new mechanism to dynamically select the best performing combinations of acceleration coefficients, inertia weight, and population size. A fractional order fuzzy-PID (fuzzy-FOPID) controller based on the DPSO algorithm is proposed to perform the optimization task of the controller gains and improve the performance of a single-shaft Combined Cycle Power Plant (CCPP). The proposed controller is used in speed control loop to improve the response during frequency drop or change in loading. The performance of the fuzzy-FOPID based DPSO is compared with those of the conventional PSO, Comprehensive Learning PSO (CLPSO), Heterogeneous CLPSO (HCLPSO), Genetic Algorithm (GA), Differential Evolution (DE), and Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) algorithm. The simulation results show the effectiveness and performance of the proposed method for frequency drop or change in loading.     

Application of dynamic neighborhood small population particle swarm optimization for reconfiguration of shipboard power system

In all-electric navy ships, severe damage or faults may occur during different conditions. As a result, critical loads may suffer from power deficiencies, ultimately leading to a complete system collapse. Therefore, a fast reconfiguration of shipboard power system (SPS) is necessary to serve the critical loads. This work proposes a novel swarm intelligent algorithm based on dynamic neighborhood small population particle swarm optimization (PSO) (DNSPPSO). DNSPPSO is a variant of PSO having fewer numbers of particles and regenerating new solutions within the search space every few iterations. This concept of regeneration in DNSPPSO makes the algorithm fast and greatly enhances its capability. Meanwhile, this algorithm can handle multi-objective problem effectively by using dynamic neighborhood strategy. This technique sorts the objectives and evaluates objectives one by one but retaining the global best solution and fitness so far. Therefore, the strategy converts the multi-objective problem into a single objective optimization problem. The strength of the proposed reconfiguration strategy is demonstrated by an 8-bus test example in Matlab environment comparing with discrete PSO (DPSO), small population PSO (SPPSO) and NSGA-II.     

Annealing-based particle swarm optimization to solve the redundant reliability problem with multiple component choices

In this paper, the performance of a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm named Annealing-based PSO (APSO) is investigated to solve the redundant reliability problem with multiple component choices (RRP-MCC). This problem aims to choose an optimal combination of components and redundancy levels for a system with a series–parallel configuration that maximizes the overall system reliability. PSO is a population-based meta-heuristic algorithm inspired by the social behavior of the biological swarms that is designed for continuous decision spaces. As a local search engine (LSE), the proposed APSO employs the Metropolis-Hastings strategy, the key idea behind the simulated annealing (SA) algorithm. In APSO, the best position among all particles in each iteration is dynamically improved using the inner loop of the SA (i.e., equilibrium loop) while the temperature is updated in the main loop of the PSO algorithm. The well-known benchmarks are used to verify the performance of the proposed APSO. Even though APSO fails to outperform the best solution obtained in the literature, the contribution of this paper is comprised of the implementation of APSO as a hybrid meta-heuristic as well as the effect of Metropolis-Hastings strategy on the performance of the classical PSO.     

A hybrid cuckoo search and genetic algorithm for reliability–redundancy allocation problems

Solving reliability and redundancy allocation problems via meta-heuristic algorithms has attracted increasing attention in recent years. In this study, a recently developed meta-heuristic optimization algorithm cuckoo search (CS) is hybridized with well-known genetic algorithm (GA) called CS–GA is proposed to solve the reliability and redundancy allocation problem. By embedding the genetic operators in standard CS, the balance between the exploration and exploitation ability further improved and more search space are observed during the algorithms’ performance. The computational results carried out on four classical reliability–redundancy allocation problems taken from the literature confirm the validity of the proposed algorithm. Experimental results are presented and compared with the best known solutions. The comparison results with other evolutionary optimization methods demonstrate that the proposed CS–GA algorithm proves to be extremely effective and efficient at locating optimal solutions.     

A particle swarm optimization algorithm for optimal car-call allocation in elevator group control systems

High-rise buildings require the installation of complex elevator group control systems (EGCSs). In vertical transportation, when a passenger makes a hall call by pressing a landing call button installed at the floor and located near the cars of the elevator group, the EGCS must allocate one of the cars of the group to the hall call. We develop a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm to deal with this car-call allocation problem. The PSO algorithm is compared to other soft computing techniques such as genetic algorithm and tabu search approaches that have been proved as efficient algorithms for this problem. The proposed PSO algorithm was tested in high-rise buildings from 10 to 24 floors, and several car configurations from 2 to 6 cars. Results from trials show that the proposed PSO algorithm results in better average journey times and computational times compared to genetic and tabu search approaches.     

云环境下基于DPSO的任务调度算法

针对云计算任务调度问题,结合粒子群优化(PSO)算法的种群个体协作和信息共享特点,提出一种基于离散粒子群优化(DPSO)的任务调度算法。采用随机方法生成初始种群,利用时变方式调整惯性权重,并在位置更新中使用绝对值取整求余映射法进行合法化处理,提高PSO算法的离散化程度。搭建并重新编译了CloudSim云计算仿真平台进行实验,结果显示,当迭代次数为200时,DPSO、PSO、GA算法的所有任务最终调度时间分别为457.69 s、467.90 s、472.41 s,从而证明DPSO算法能够有效解决云计算环境下的任务调度问题,并且算法收敛速度优于PSO和GA算法。     

Multi-level redundancy optimization in series systems

Single-level systems have been considered in redundancy allocation problems. It may be the best policy in some specific situations, but not in general. In regards to reliability, it is most effective to duplicate the lowest objects, because parallel-series systems are more reliable than series-parallel systems. However, the smaller an object is, the more time and higher accuracy are needed for duplicating it, and so, redundancy cost can be decreased by using modular redundancy. Therefore, providing redundancy at high levels like as modules or subsystems, can be more economical than providing redundancy at low level of components. In this paper, the problem in which redundancy is available at all levels in a series system is addressed and a mixed integer programming model is presented. A heuristic algorithm and a genetic algorithm are proposed to solve the problem and some examples illustrate the procedure.     

Attributed multi-objective comprehensive learning particle swarm optimization for optimal security of networks

In particle swarm optimization (PSO) each particle uses its personal and global or local best positions by linear summation. However, it is very time consuming to find the global or local best positions in case of complex problems. To overcome this problem, we propose a new multi-objective variant of PSO called attributed multi-objective comprehensive learning particle swarm optimizer (A-MOCLPSO). In this technique, we do not use global or local best positions to modify the velocity of a particle; instead, we use the best position of a randomly selected particle from the whole population to update the velocity of each dimension. This method not only increases the speed of the algorithm but also searches in more promising areas of the search space. We perform an extensive experimentation on well-known benchmark problems such as Schaffer (SCH), Kursawa (KUR), and Zitzler–Deb–Thiele (ZDT) functions. The experiments show very convincing results when the proposed technique is compared with existing versions of PSO known as multi-objective comprehensive learning particle swarm optimizer (MOCLPSO) and multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO), as well as non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (NSGA-II). As a case study, we apply our proposed A-MOCLPSO algorithm on an attack tree model for the security hardening problem of a networked system in order to optimize the total security cost and the residual damage, and provide diverse solutions for the problem. The results of our experiments show that the proposed algorithm outperforms the previous solutions obtained for the security hardening problem using NSGA-II, as well as MOCLPSO for the same problem. Hence, the proposed algorithm can be considered as a strong alternative to solve multi-objective optimization problems.     

Cold-standby redundancy allocation problem with degrading components

Components in cold-standby state are usually assumed to be as good as new when they are activated. However, even in a standby environment, the components will suffer from performance degradation. This article presents a study of a redundancy allocation problem (RAP) for cold-standby systems with degrading components. The objective of the RAP is to determine an optimal design configuration of components to maximize system reliability subject to system resource constraints (e.g. cost, weight). As in most cases, it is not possible to obtain a closed-form expression for this problem, and hence, an approximated objective function is presented. A genetic algorithm with dual mutation is developed to solve such a constrained optimization problem. Finally, a numerical example is given to illustrate the proposed solution methodology.     

Solving the multi-stage portfolio optimization problem with a novel particle swarm optimization

Solving the multi-stage portfolio optimization (MSPO) problem is very challenging due to nonlinearity of the problem and its high consumption of computational time. Many heuristic methods have been employed to tackle the problem. In this paper, we propose a novel variant of particle swarm optimization (PSO), called drift particle swarm optimization (DPSO), and apply it to the MSPO problem solving. The classical return-variance function is employed as the objective function, and experiments on the problems with different numbers of stages are conducted by using sample data from various stocks in S&P 100 index. We compare performance and effectiveness of DPSO, particle swarm optimization (PSO), genetic algorithm (GA) and two classical optimization solvers (LOQO and CPLEX), in terms of efficient frontiers, fitness values, convergence rates and computational time consumption. The experiment results show that DPSO is more efficient and effective in MSPO problem solving than other tested optimization tools.     

A differential evolution algorithm to solve redundancy allocation problems

To improve system reliability without changing its nature, three methods are proposed. The first method uses more reliable components and the second method provides redundant components within the system. The third method is a combination of these two methods. The redundancy allocation problem (RAP) finds the appropriate mix of components and redundancies within a system to maximize its reliability or minimize its cost due to several constraints, such as cost, weight, and volume. This paper presents a methodology to solve the RAP, which is an NP‐hard problem, modeled with discrete variables. In this paper, we use a metaheuristic to solve the RAP of a series–parallel system with a mix of components. Our metaheuristic offers a practical method with specific solution encoding, and combines a penalty function to solve large instances of the relaxed RAP, where different types of components can be used in parallel. The efficiency of the algorithm was tested through a set of well‐known benchmark problems from the literature. Testing of the algorithm achieved satisfactory results in reasonable computing time.     

On the use of particle swarm optimization for adaptive resource allocation in orthogonal frequency division multiple access systems with proportional rate constraints

Orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) is a promising technique, which can provide high downlink capacity for future wireless systems. The total capacity of OFDMA can be maximized by adaptively assigning subchannels to the user with the best gain for that subchannel, with power subsequently distributed by water-filling algorithm. In this paper we have proposed the use of a customized particle swarm optimization (PSO) aided algorithm to allocate the subchannels. The PSO algorithm is population-based: a set of potential solutions evolves to approach a near-optimal solution for the problem under study. The customized algorithm works for discrete particle positions unlike the classical PSO algorithm which is valid for only continuous particle positions. It is shown that the proposed method obtains higher sum capacities as compared to that obtained by previous works, with comparable computational complexity.     

一种惯性权重动态调整的新型粒子群算法

在简要介绍基本PSO算法的基础上,提出了一种根据不同粒子距离全局最优点的距离对基本PSO算法的惯性权重进行动态调整的新型粒子群算法（DPSO）．并对新算法进行了描述。以典型优化问题的实例仿真验证了DPSO算法的有效性。     

An efficient memory-based electromagnetism-like mechanism for the redundancy allocation problem

Meta-heuristic algorithms have been successfully applied to solve the redundancy allocation problem in recent years. Among these algorithms, the electromagnetism-like mechanism (EM) is a powerful population-based algorithm designed for continuous decision spaces. This paper presents an efficient memory-based electromagnetism-like mechanism called MBEM to solve the redundancy allocation problem. The proposed algorithm employs a memory matrix in local search to save the features of good solutions and feed it back to the algorithm. This would make the search process more efficient. To verify the good performance of MBEM, various test problems, especially the 33 well-known benchmark instances in the literature, are examined. The experimental results show that not only optimal solutions of all benchmark instances are obtained within a reasonable computer execution time, but also MBEM outperforms EM in terms of the quality of the solutions obtained, even for large-size problems.     

Task Scheduling in Distributed Systems Using Heap Intelligent Discrete Particle Swarm Optimization

The optimal mapping of tasks to the processors is one of the challenging issues in heterogeneous computing systems. This article presents a task scheduling problem in distributed systems using discrete particle swarm optimization (DPSO) algorithm with various neighborhood topologies. The DPSO is a recent metaheuristic population‐based algorithm. In DPSO, the set of particles in a swarm flies through the N‐dimensional search space by learning from both the personal best position and a neighborhood best position. Each particle inside the swarm belongs to a specific topology for communicating with neighboring particles in the swarm. The neighborhood topology affects the performance of DPSO significantly, because it determines the rate at which information transmits through the swarm. The proposed DPSO algorithm works on dynamic topology that is binary heap tree for communication between the particles in the swarm. The performance of the proposed topology is compared with other topologies such as star, ring, fully connected, binary tree, and Von Neumann. The three well‐known performance measures such as Makespan, mean flow time, and reliability cost are used for the comparison of the proposed topology with other neighborhood topologies. Computational simulation results indicate that the performance of DPSO algorithm has shown significant improvement with binary heap tree topology used for communication among the particles in the swarm.     

An efficient heuristic for series–parallel redundant reliability problems

This paper presents a novel algorithm for solving a series–parallel redundancy allocation problem with separable constraints. The idea of a heuristic approach design is inspired from the greedy method and the genetic algorithm. The structure of the algorithm includes: (1) randomly generating a specified population size number of minimum workable solutions; (2) assigning components either according to the greedy method or to the random selection method; and (3) improving solutions through an inner-system and inter-system solution revision process. Numerical results for the 33 test problems from previous research are reported and compared. As reported in this paper, the solutions found by our approach are all better than or are in par with the well-known best solutions from the approach taken by previous solutions.     

A new approach for solving set covering problem using jumping particle swarm optimization method

The set covering problem (SCP) is a well known classic combinatorial NP-hard problem, having practical application in many fields. To optimize the objective function of the SCP, many heuristic, meta heuristic, greedy and approximation approaches have been proposed in the recent years. In the development of swarm intelligence, the particle swarm optimization is a nature inspired optimization technique for continuous problems and for discrete problems we have the well known discrete particle swarm optimization (DPSO) method. Aiming towards the best solution for discrete problems, we have the recent method called jumping particle swarm optimization (JPSO). In this DPSO the improved solution is based on the particles attraction caused by attractor. In this paper, a new approach based on JPSO is proposed to solve the SCP. The proposed approach works in three phases: for selecting attractor, refining the feasible solution given by the attractor in order to reach the optimality and for removing redundancy in the solution. The proposed approach has been tested on the benchmark instances of SCP and compared with best known methods. Computational results show that it produces high quality solution in very short running times when compared to other algorithms.