Research Area:  Metaheuristic Computing

Abstract:

The optimisation of complex engineering design problems is highly challenging due to the consideration of various design variables. To obtain acceptable near-optimal solutions within reasonable computation time, metaheuristics can be employed for such problems. However, a plethora of novel metaheuristic algorithms are developed and constantly improved and hence it is important to evaluate the applicability of the novel optimisation strategies and compare their performance using real-world engineering design problems. Therefore, in this paper, eight recent population-based metaheuristic optimisation algorithms—African Vultures Optimisation Algorithm (AVOA), Crystal Structure Algorithm (CryStAl), Human-Behaviour Based Optimisation (HBBO), Gradient-Based Optimiser (GBO), Gorilla Troops Optimiser (GTO), Runge–Kutta optimiser (RUN), Social Network Search (SNS) and Sparrow Search Algorithm (SSA)—are applied to five different mechanical component design problems and their performance on such problems are compared. The results show that the SNS algorithm is consistent, robust and provides better quality solutions at a relatively fast computation time for the considered design problems. GTO and GBO also show comparable performance across the considered problems and AVOA is the most efficient in terms of computation time.

Keywords:  
mechanical design
component design
product design
metaheuristics
artificial intelligence
benchmark
soft computing
evolutionary intelligence
swarm intelligence

Author(s) Name:  Bugra Alkan and Malarvizhi Kaniappan Chinnathai

Publisher name:  MDPI

DOI:   10.3390/machines9120341

Volume Information:  Volume 9,Issue 12

Paper Link:   https://www.mdpi.com/2075-1702/9/12/341