Evolutionary Computation with Biogeography-based Optimization

2Biogeography and Biological Optimization

Bio-inspired metaheuristics are computer systems that are motivated by ideas from the natural world. In addition, computer science research can be used to model and explore biological systems. These two approaches interact to advance the development of artificial intelligence. The approach to artificial intelligence taken by bio-inspired metaheuristics constructs simple systems that are able to evolve into more complex ones. Biological systems have many advantages over computer systems, such as less energy consumption, the ability to survive faults and even the ability to heal. Many of the ideas taken from biological optimization processes have been applied to design bio-inspired metaheuristic algorithms, leading to new developments in artificial intelligence. Biogeography is considered in this chapter as a natural optimization mechanism that can motivate the development of BBO.

Overview of the chapter

This chapter gives an overview of a mathematical model of biogeography in section 2.1 and discusses its interpretation as a naturally occurring optimization process in section 2.2. We discuss some bio-inspired metaheuristic algorithms other than BBO that are motivated by biological optimization processes in section 2.3.

2.1. A mathematical model of biogeography

In the previous chapter, we mentioned a mathematical model of island biogeography which is based on the idea that the number of species in an undisturbed habitat is mostly determined ...