This paper introduces the concept of heuristic space diversity and investigates various strategies for the management of heuristic space diversity within the context of a meta-hyper-heuristic algorithm. Evaluation on a diverse set of floating-point benchmark problems show that heuristic space diversity has a significant impact on hyper-heuristic performance. The increasing heuristic space diversity strategies performed the best out of all strategies tested. Good performance was also demonstrated with respect to another popular multi-method algorithm and the best performing constituent algorithm.

This paper investigates the algorithm selection problem, otherwise referred to as the entity-to-algorithm allocation problem, within the context of three recent multi-method algorithm frameworks. A population-based algorithm portfolio, a meta-hyper-heuristic and a bandit based operator selection method are evaluated under similar conditions on a diverse set of floating-point benchmark problems. The meta-hyper heuristic is shown to outperform the other two algorithms.

This paper investigates the use of local search strategies to improve the performance of a meta-hyper-heuristic algorithm, a hyper-heuristic which employs one or more meta-heuristics as low-level heuristics. Alternative mechanisms for selecting the solutions to be refined further by means of local search, as well as the intensity of subsequent refinement in terms of number of allowable function evaluations, are investigated. Furthermore, defining a local search as one of the low-level heuristics versus applying the algorithm directly to the solution space is also investigated. Performance is evaluated on a diverse set of floating-point benchmark problems. The addition of local search was found to improve algorithm results significantly. Random selection of solutions for further refinement was identified as the best selection strategy and a higher intensity of refinement was identified as most desirable. Better results were obtained by applying the local search algorithm directly to the search space instead of defining it as a low-level heuristic.

Algorithm selection is an important consideration in multi-method global optimization. This paper investigates the use of various algorithm selection strategies derived from well known evolutionary selection mechanisms. Selection strategy performance is evaluated on a diverse set of floating point benchmark problems and meaningful conclusions are drawn with regard to the impact of selective pressure on algorithm selection in a multi-method environment.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the use of meta-heuristics as low-level heuristics in a hyper-heuristic framework. A novel multi-method hyper-heuristic algorithm which makes use of a number of common meta-heuristics is presented. Algorithm performance is evaluated on a diverse set of real parameter benchmark problems and meaningful conclusions are drawn with respect to the selection of alternative low-level heuristics and the acceptance of the obtained solutions within the proposed multi-method meta-heuristic approach.

This paper introduces a new vector evaluated multi-objective optimization algorithm. The vector evaluated differential evolution particle swarm optimization (VEDEPSO) algorithm is a hybridization of the classical vector evaluated particle swarm optimization (VEPSO) and vector evaluated differential evolution (VEDE) algorithms of Parsopoulos et. al. Comparisons of VEDEPSO with respect to VEPSO and VEDE on a well known multi-objective benchmark problem set indicated that significant performance improvements can be attributed to the VEDEPSO algorithm.

This paper investigates the application of alternative multi-objective optimization (MOO) strategies to a complex scheduling problem. Two vector evaluated algorithms, namely the vector evaluated particle swarm optimization (VEPSO) algorithm as well as the vector evaluated differential evolution (VEDE) algorithm is compared to a differential evolution based modified goal programming approach. This paper is considered significant since no other reference to the application of vector evaluated algorithms in a scheduling environment could be found. Algorithm performance is evaluated on real customer data and meaningful conclusions are drawn with respect to the application of MOO algorithms in a multiple machine multi-objective scheduling environment.