Cellular evolutionary algorithm

<p>A cellular evolutionary algorithm (cEA) is a kind of <a href="/facts/Evolutionary_algorithm/bo7eHlcA">evolutionary algorithm</a> (EA) in which individuals cannot mate arbitrarily, but every one interacts with its closer neighbors on which a basic EA is applied (selection, variation, replacement).
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<p>The cellular model simulates natural evolution from the point of view of
the individual, which encodes a tentative optimization, learning, or search problem solution. The essential idea of this model is to provide the EA population
with a special structure defined as a connected graph, in which each vertex is an individual who communicates with his
nearest neighbors. Particularly, individuals are conceptually set in a toroidal
mesh, and are only allowed to recombine with close individuals. This leads
to a kind of locality known as "isolation by distance". The set of potential mates
of an individual is called its "neighborhood". It is known that, in this kind
of algorithm, similar individuals tend to cluster creating niches, and these groups
operate as if they were separate sub-populations (islands). There is no
clear borderline between adjacent groups, and close niches could be easily
colonized by competitive niches and potentially merge solution contents during the process. Simultaneously, farther niches can be affected more slowly.
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Cellular evolutionary algorithm open-in-new

Cellular evolutionary algorithm