Simple Ant Colony Optimization Research Articles

Vehicle Motion Planning for the Visually Challenged People Using Ant Colony Optimization

This paper presents a novel proposal to solve the problem of obstacle detection and path planning for visually challenged people based on simple Ant Colony Optimization Meta-heuristic (SACO-MH). The mission of the path planning problem is to enable the vehicle to move from the starting point to the target point while satisfying certain constraints. Constraint conditions are: not a collision with known or unknown obstacles, away from the obstacle as far as possible, determines the shortest path, shortest time and so on. Obstacle detection is made with the help of sensor technology and it is intimated to the user with the help of a smart watch. A voice based navigation system guides the user

Two view NURBS reconstruction based on GACO model

The key job here in the presented work is to investigate the performance of Generalized Ant Colony Optimizer (GACO) model in order to evolve the shape of three dimensional free-form Non Uniform Rational B-Spline (NURBS) curve using stereo (two) views. GACO model is a blend of two well known meta-heuristic optimization algorithms known as Simple Ant Colony and Global Ant Colony Optimization algorithms. Basically, the work talks about the solution of NURBS-fitting based reconstruction process. Therefore, GACO model is used to optimize the NURBS parameters (control points and weights) by minimizing the weighted least-square errors between the data points and the fitted NURBS curve. The algorithm is applied by first assuming some pre-fixed values of NURBS parameters. The experiments clearly show that the optimization procedure is a better option in a case where good initial locations of parameters are selected. A detailed experimental analysis is given in support of our algorithm. The implemented error analysis shows that the proposed methodology perform better as compared to the conventional methods.

OPTIMUM PATH DETERMINATION TO FACILITATE FIRE STATION RESCUE MISSIONS USING ANT COLONY OPTIMIZATION ALGORITHMS (CASE STUDY: CITY OF KARAJ)

Abstract. The successful conduct of a rescue mission in urban areas is directly related to the timely deployment of equipment and personnel to the incident location which justifies the quest for optimum path selection for emergency purposes. In this study, it is attempted to use Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) to find the optimum paths between fire stations and incident locations. It is also attempted to build up an evaluation tool using ACO to detect critical road segments that the overall accessibility to fire station services throughout the urban area is constituted upon their excellent functionality. Therefore, an ACO solution is designed to find optimum paths between the fire station and some randomly distributed incident locations. Regarding different variants of ACO, the algorithm enjoys the Simple Ant Colony Optimization deployment strategy combined with Ant Algorithm Transition rules. Iteration best pheromone updating is also used as the pheromone reinforcement strategy. The cost function used to optimize the path considers the shortest Euclidean distance on the network. The results explicitly state that the proposed method is successful to create the optimum path in 95.45 percent of all times, compared to Dijkstra deterministic approaches. Moreover, the pheromone map as an indicator of the criticality of road elements is generated and discussed. Visual inspection shows that the pheromone map is verified as the road criticality map concerning fire station access to the region and therefore pre-emptive measures can be defined by analyzing the generated pheromone map.

RETRACTED: Path planning for unmanned wheeled robot based on improved ant colony optimization

This research presents a simple and novel improved ant colony optimization for path planning of unmanned wheeled robot. Our main concern is to avoid the random deadlock situation and to reach at the destination using the shortest path, to decrease lost ants and improve the efficiency of solutions. The aforementioned reasons, we design an adaptive heuristic function by adopting the Euclidean distance between the ant and the target destination, in order to avoid the initial blindness and later singleness of ant path searching. The historical best path when appropriate to retain the previous effort would supersede the current worst path. Simulation results under random maps show that the improved ant colony optimization considerably increases the number of effective ants. During the searching process, the probability to find the optimal path increases, as well as the search speed. Moreover, we also compare the improved ant colony optimization performance with the simple ant colony optimization.

Multi-Criteria based Ant Colony Optimization to Improve Quality of Services of Manets

Mobile Adhoc Networks (MANETs) is one of the fastest growing research areas in the field of communications technologies. The constant movement of the nodes in such networks leads to topological changes which causes link breakages among the nodes. The existing work focuses on optimizing the path from source to destination using simple ant colony optimization without focusing on improving the energy consumption or reducing the link breakages. The proposed work considers different parameters such as Pheromone Value, Euclidean distance, Residual energy and mobility of the nodes into account while optimizing the route of the mobile ad hoc network. The proposed system has been implemented using NS2 and the performance has been analyzed based on remaining energy of the network, packet drops, packet delivery ratio, throughput and end to end delay. Experimental results indicate increased performance of the network against current techniques.

Generalized Ant Colony Optimizer: swarm-based meta-heuristic algorithm for cloud services execution

This work presents a swarm-based meta-heuristic technique known as Generalized Ant Colony Optimizer (GACO). It is a hybrid approach which consists of Simple Ant Colony Optimization and Global Colony Optimization concepts. The main concept behind GACO is the foraging behavior of ants. GACO operates in the following four phases: Creation of a new colony, search of nearest food location, balance the solution, and updating of pheromone. GACO has been tested on seventeen well recognized standard benchmark functions and its results have been compared with three different meta-heuristic algorithms namely as Genetic Algorithm, Particle Swarm Optimization and Artificial Bee Colony. The performance metrics such as average and standard deviation are computed and evaluated with respect to these metrics. The proposed GACO performs better in comparison to the aforementioned algorithms. The proposed algorithm optimizes the cloud resource allocation problem and gives better results with unknown search spaces.

Ant colony algorithm for satellite control resource scheduling problem

With the increasing number of satellite, the satellite control resource scheduling problem (SCRSP) has been main challenge for satellite networks. SCRSP is a constrained and large scale combinatorial problem. More and more researches focus on how to allocate various measurement and control resources effectively to ensure the normal running of the satellites. However, the sparse solution space of SCRSP leads its complexity especially for traditional optimization algorithms. As the validity of ant colony optimization (ACO) has been shown in many combinatorial optimization problems, a simple ant colony optimization algorithm (SACO) to solve SCRSP is presented in this paper. Firstly, we give a general mathematical model of SCRSP. Then, a optimization model, called conflict construction graph, based on visible arc and working period is introduced to reduce workload of dispatchers. To meet the requirements of TT & C network and make the algorithm more practical, we make the parameters of SACO as constant, which include the bounds, update and initialization of pheromone. The effect of parameters on the algorithm performance is studied by experimental method based on SCRSP. Finally, the performance of SACO is compared with other novel ACO algorithms to show the feasibility and effectiveness of improvements.

Performance Analysis of ACO on the Quadratic Assignment Problem

The Quadratic assignment problem (QAP) is to assign a set of facilities to a set of locations with given distances between the locations and given flows between the facilities such that the sum of the products between flows and distances is minimized, which is a notoriously difficult NP-hard combinatorial optimization problem. A lot of heuristics have been proposed for the QAP problem, and some of them have proved to be efficient approximation algorithms for this problem. Ant colony optimization (ACO) is a general-purpose heuristic and usually considered as an approximation algorithms for NP-hard optimization problems. However, we know little about the performance of ACO for QAP from a theoretical perspective. This paper contributes to a theoretical understanding of ACO on the QAP problem. The worst-case bound on a simple ACO algorithm called (1+1) Max-min ant algorithm ((1+1) MMAA) for the QAP problem is presented. It is shown that a degenerate (1+1) MMAA finds an approximate solution on the QAP problem. Finally, we reveal that ACO can outperform the 2-exchange local search algorithm on an instance of the QAP problem.

A new algorithm based on Region Partitioning for Filtering candidate viewpoints of a multiple viewshed

ABSTRACTSelecting the set of candidate viewpoints (CVs) is one of the most important procedures in multiple viewshed analysis. However, the quantity of CVs remains excessive even when only terrain feature points are selected. Here we propose the Region Partitioning for Filtering (RPF) algorithm, which uses a region partitioning method to filter CVs of a multiple viewshed. The region partitioning method is used to decompose an entire area into several regions. The quality of CVs can be evaluated by summarizing the viewshed area of each CV in each region. First, the RPF algorithm apportions each CV to a region wherein the CV has a larger viewshed than that in other regions. Then, CVs with relatively small viewshed areas are removed from their original regions or reassigned to another region in each iterative step. In this way, a set of high-quality CVs can be preserved, and the size of the preserved CVs can be controlled by the RPF algorithm. To evaluate the computational efficiency of the RPF algorithm, its performance was compared with simple random (SR), simulated annealing (SA), and ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithms. Experimental results indicate that the RPF algorithm provides more than a 20% improvement over the SR algorithm, and that, on average, the computation time of the RPF algorithm is 63% that of the ACO algorithm.

A genetic ant colony optimization based algorithm for solid multiple travelling salesmen problem in fuzzy rough environment

In this paper, a genetic-ant colony optimization algorithm has been presented to solve a solid multiple Travelling Salesmen Problem (mTSP) in fuzzy rough environment. In solid mTSP, a set of nodes (locations/cities) are given, and each of the cities must be visited exactly once by the salesmen such that all of them start and finish at a depot using different conveyance facility. A solid mTSP is an extension of mTSP where the travellers use different conveyance facilities for travelling from one city to another. To solve an mTSP, a hybrid algorithm has been developed based on the concept of two algorithms, namely genetic algorithm (GA) and ant colony optimization (ACO) based algorithm. Each salesman selects his/her route using ACO and the routes of different salesmen (to construct a complete solution) are controlled by the GA. Here, a set of simple ACO characteristics have further been modified by incorporating a special feature namely ‘refinement’. In this paper, we have utilized cyclic crossover and two-point’s mutation in the proposed algorithm to solve the problem. The travelling cost is considered as imprecise in nature (fuzzy-rough) and is reduced to its approximate crisp using fuzzy-rough expectation. Computational results with different data sets are presented and some sensitivity analysis has also been made.

Runtime analysis of the 1-ANT ant colony optimizer

The runtime analysis of randomized search heuristics is a growing field where, in the last two decades, many rigorous results have been obtained. First runtime analyses of ant colony optimization (ACO) have been conducted only recently. In these studies simple ACO algorithms such as the 1-ANT are investigated. The influence of the evaporation factor in the pheromone update mechanism and the robustness of this parameter w.r.t. the runtime behavior have been determined for the example function OneMax. This work puts forward the rigorous runtime analysis of the 1-ANT on the example functions LeadingOnes and BinVal. With respect to Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs), such analyses were essential to develop methods for the analysis on more complicated problems. The proof techniques required for the 1-ANT, unfortunately, differ significantly from those for EAs, which means that a new reservoir of methods has to be built up. Again, the influence of the evaporation factor is analyzed rigorously, and it is proved that its choice has a crucial impact on the runtime. Moreover, the analyses provide insight into the working principles of ACO algorithms. Our theoretical results are accompanied by experimental results that give us a more detailed impression of the 1-ANT’s performance. Furthermore, the experiments also deal with the question whether using many ant solutions in one iteration can decrease the total runtime.

An improved ant colony optimization for the communication network routing problem

Ant colony optimization (ACO) is a population-based meta-heuristic for combinatorial optimization problems such as the communication network routing problem (CNRP). This paper proposes an improved ant colony optimization (IACO) technique, which adapts a new strategy to update the increased pheromone, called the ant-weight strategy, and a mutation operation, to solve the CNRP. The simulation results for a benchmark problem are reported and they are compared to the simple ant colony optimization (ACO) results.

Ant Colony Optimization and the minimum spanning tree problem

Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) is a kind of metaheuristic that has become very popular for solving problems from combinatorial optimization. Solutions for a given problem are constructed by a random walk on a so-called construction graph. This random walk can be influenced by heuristic information about the problem. In contrast to many successful applications, the theoretical foundation of this kind of metaheuristic is rather weak. Theoretical investigations with respect to the runtime behavior of ACO algorithms have been started only recently for the optimization of pseudo-Boolean functions. We present the first comprehensive rigorous analysis of a simple ACO algorithm for a combinatorial optimization problem. In our investigations, we consider the minimum spanning tree (MST) problem and examine the effect of two construction graphs with respect to the runtime behavior. The choice of the construction graph in an ACO algorithm seems to be crucial for the success of such an algorithm. First, we take the input graph itself as the construction graph and analyze the use of a construction procedure that is similar to Broder’s algorithm for choosing a spanning tree uniformly at random. After that, a more incremental construction procedure is analyzed. It turns out that this procedure is superior to the Broder-based algorithm and produces additionally in a constant number of iterations an MST, if the influence of the heuristic information is large enough.

Runtime Analysis of an Ant Colony Optimization Algorithm for TSP Instances

Ant colony optimization (ACO) is a relatively new random heuristic approach for solving optimization problems. The main application of the ACO algorithm lies in the field of combinatorial optimization, and the traveling salesman problem (TSP) is the first benchmark problem to which the ACO algorithm has been applied. However, relatively few results on the runtime analysis of the ACO on the TSP are available. This paper presents the first rigorous analysis of a simple ACO algorithm called (1 + 1) MMAA (Max-Min ant algorithm) on the TSP. The expected runtime bounds for (1 + 1) MMAA on two TSP instances of complete and non-complete graphs are obtained. The influence of the parameters controlling the relative importance of pheromone trail versus visibility is also analyzed, and their choice is shown to have an impact on the expected runtime.

Path planning for autonomous mobile robot navigation with ant colony optimization and fuzzy cost function evaluation

In the Motion Planning research field, heuristic methods have demonstrated to outperform classical approaches gaining popularity in the last 35 years. Several ideas have been proposed to overcome the complex nature of this NP-Complete problem. Ant Colony Optimization algorithms are heuristic methods that have been successfully used to deal with this kind of problems. This paper presents a novel proposal to solve the problem of path planning for mobile robots based on Simple Ant Colony Optimization Meta-Heuristic (SACO-MH). The new method was named SACOdm, where d stands for distance and m for memory. In SACOdm, the decision making process is influenced by the existing distance between the source and target nodes; moreover the ants can remember the visited nodes. The new added features give a speed up around 10 in many cases. The selection of the optimal path relies in the criterion of a Fuzzy Inference System, which is adjusted using a Simple Tuning Algorithm. The path planner application has two operating modes, one is for virtual environments, and the second one works with a real mobile robot using wireless communication. Both operating modes are global planners for plain terrain and support static and dynamic obstacle avoidance.

Optimal job sequence determination and operation machine allocation in flexible manufacturing systems: an approach using adaptive hierarchical ant colony algorithm

In this paper, an Adaptive Hierarchical Ant Colony Optimization (AHACO) has been proposed to resolve the traditional machine loading problem in Flexible Manufacturing Systems (FMS). Machine loading is one of the most important issues that is interlinked with the efficiency and utilization of FMS. The machine loading problem is formulated in order to minimize the system unbalance and maximize the throughput, considering the job sequencing, optional machines and technological constraints. The performance of proposed AHACO has been tested over a number of benchmark problems taken from the literature. Computational results indicate that the proposed algorithm is more effective and produces promising results as compared to the existing solution methodologies in the literature. The evaluation and comparison of system efficiency and system utilization justifies the supremacy of the algorithm. Further, results obtained from the proposed algorithm have been compared with well known random search algorithm viz. genetic algorithm, simulated annealing, artificial Immune system, simple ant colony optimization, tabu search etc. In addition, the algorithm has been tested over a randomly generated problem set of varying complexities; the results validate the robustness and scalability of the algorithm utilizing the concepts of ‘heuristic gap’ and ANOVA analysis.

Runtime Analysis of a Simple Ant Colony Optimization Algorithm

Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) has become quite popular in recent years. In contrast to many successful applications, the theoretical foundation of this randomized search heuristic is rather weak. Building up such a theory is demanded to understand how these heuristics work as well as to come up with better algorithms for certain problems. Up to now, only convergence results have been achieved showing that optimal solutions can be obtained in finite time. We present the first runtime analysis of an ACO algorithm, which transfers many rigorous results with respect to the runtime of a simple evolutionary algorithm to our algorithm. Moreover, we examine the choice of the evaporation factor, a crucial parameter in ACO algorithms, in detail. By deriving new lower bounds on the tails of sums of independent Poisson trials, we determine the effect of the evaporation factor almost completely and prove a phase transition from exponential to polynomial runtime.