Introduction to Genetic Algorithms

1.1 Introduction
Evolutionary computing was introduced in the 1960s by I. Rechenberg,
then was developed by other researches. The theory of evolution was
introduced by Charles Darwin (1859) to explain his observations of plants
and animals in the natural ecosystem. He observed that as every new
generation was associated with some changes, the less-fit individuals
tended to lose the battle for survival in the competition for food.
Genetic Algorithms (GAs) mimics the theory of evolution and natural
selection. Genetic Algorithms was invented and developed by John
Holland in 1975. Holland proposed GA as a heuristic method based on
“Survival of the fittest”. GA was discovered as a useful tool for search
and optimization problems.
It is also important to mention in this introduction GA limits. Like most
stochastic methods, GAs are not guaranteed to find the global optimum
solution to a problem, they are satisfied with finding “acceptably good”
solutions to the problem.
GAs are extensively used in many applications across a large and
growing number of disciplines. Although a GA is able to find very good
solutions for a variety of applications, the amount of time consumed for
large computations and iterations is enormous. Hence, software
implementation of GAs for increasingly complex applications can cause
unacceptable delays. Also, GAs lend themselves easily to pipelining and
parallelization. These factors make GAs good candidates for hardware
implementation.
From the optimization point of view, the main advantage of evolutionary
computation techniques is that they do not have much mathematical
requirements about the optimization problems. All they need is an

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evaluation of the objective function. As a result, they are applied to non-
linear problems, defined on discrete, continuous or mixed search spaces.
1.2 Search Space
Most often one is looking for the best solution in a specific set of
solutions. The space of all feasible solutions (the set of solutions among
which the desired solution resides) is called search space (also state
space). Each and every point in the search space represents one possible
solution. Therefore each possible solution can be “marked” by its fitness
value, depending on the problem definition. With Genetic Algorithm one
looks for the best solution among a number of possible solutions
represented by one point in the search space i.e.; GAs are used to search
the search space for the best solution e.g., minimum. The difficulties in
this ease are the local minima and the starting point of the search (see Fig.
1.1).

Fig. 1.1 An Example of search space

1.3 What is Genetic Algorithm

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The science that deals with the mechanisms responsible for similarities
and differences in a species is called Genetics. The word “genetics” is
derived from the Greek word “genesis” meaning “to grow” or “to
become”.
Genetic Algorithms are a class of evolutionary algorithms that use
biologically-derived techniques such as inheritance, natural selection,
crossover (or recombination) and mutation. They work on the principle
of “survival of the fittest”, where the less fit members of a particular
generation are replaced by new members formed by combining parts of
highly fit members. Traditionally, solutions to GAs are represented in
binary as strings of 0s and 1s, but different encoding schemes are also
possible.
GAs differ from other conventional optimization processes in:
1. GAs work with a coding of the parameter set, not the parameters
themselves.
2. GAs search from a population of points, not a single point.
3. GAs use objective function information, not derivatives or other
auxiliary knowledge.
4. GAs use probabilistic transition rules, not deterministic rules.
1.4 A Simple Genetic Algorithm
A genetic algorithm is a problem solving method that uses genetics as its
model of problem solving. It’s a search technique to find approximate
solutions to optimization and search problems.
GA handles a population of possible solutions. Each solution is
represented through a chromosome, which is just an abstract
representation.
- Coding all the possible solutions into a chromosome is the first part
in Genetic Algorithm.

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- A set of reproduction operators has to be determined, too.
Reproduction operators are applied directly on the chromosomes,
and are used to perform mutations and recombinations over solutions
of the problem.
- Selection is supposed to be able to compare each individual in the
population. Selection is done by using a fitness function. Each
chromosome has an associated value corresponding to the fitness of
the solution it represents. The fitness should correspond to an
evaluation of how good the candidate solution is.
- The optimal solution is the one, which maximizes the fitness
function. Genetic Algorithms deal with the problems that maximize
the fitness function. But, if the problem consists in minimizing a cost
function, the adaptation is quite easy. Either the cost function can be
transformed into a fitness function, for example by inverting it; or the
selection can be adapted in such way that they consider individuals
with low evaluation functions as better.
- Once the reproduction and the fitness function have been properly
defined, a Genetic Algorithm starts by generating an initial
population of chromosomes. This first population must offer a wide
diversity of genetic materials. The gene pool should be as large as
possible so that any solution of the search space can be engendered.
Generally, the initial population is generated randomly. Then, the
genetic algorithm loops over an iteration process to make the population
evolve. Each iteration consists of the following steps:
• SELECTION: The first step consists in selecting individuals for
reproduction. This selection is done randomly with a probability
depending on the relative fitness of the individuals so that best ones
are often chosen for reproduction than poor ones.

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• REPRODUCTION: In the second step, offspring are bred by the
selected individuals. For generating new chromosomes, the algorithm
can use both recombination and mutation.
• EVALUATION: Then the fitness of the new chromosomes is
evaluated.
• REPLACEMENT: During the last step, individuals from the old
population are killed and replaced by the new ones.
The algorithmis stopped when the population converges toward the
optimal solution.
The basic genetic algorithm is as follows:
• [start] Genetic random population of n chromosomes (suitable solutions
for the problem)
• [Fitness] Evaluate the fitness f(x) of each chromosome x in the
population
• [New population] Create a new population by repeating following steps
until the New population is complete
- [selection] select two parent chromosomes from a population according
to their fitness ( the better fitness, the bigger chance to get
selected).
- [crossover] With a crossover probability, cross over the parents to form
new offspring ( children). If no crossover was performed,
offspring is the exact copy of parents.
- [Mutation] With a mutation probability, mutate new offspring at each
locus (position in chromosome)
- [Accepting] Place new offspring in the new population.
- [Replace] Use new generated population for a further sum of the
algorithm.

• [Test] If the end condition is satisfied, stop, and return the best solution
in current population.

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• [Loop] Go to step2 for fitness evaluation.

The flowchart showing the process of GA is as shown in Fig. 1.2, while

Fig. 1.3 shows the various processes of a GA system.

Fig. 1.2 Genetic Algorithm Flow Chart

Fig. 1.3 The various processes of a GA system

In short, the basic four steps used in simple Genetic Algorithm to solve a
problem are,

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1. The representation of the problem
2. The fitness calculation
3. Various variables and parameters involved in controlling the algorithm
4. The representation of result and the way of terminating the algorithm
WHY GA WORK?
1. In each generation we check several solutions at once. Thus GA
2. is a kind of a parallel search.
3. Fitness and selection filter out bad solutions from good ones.
4. Offspring inherit properties of mostly good solutions.

1.5 Advantages and Limitations of Genetic Algorithm

The advantages of genetic algorithm includes,
1. Parallelism
2. Solution space is wider
3. Easy to discover global optimum
4. The problem has multi objective function
5. Easily modified for different problems.
6. Handles noisy functions well.
7. Handles large, poorly understood search spaces easily
8. Good for multi-modal problems Returns a suite of solutions.
9. Very robust to difficulties in the evaluation of the objective function.
10.They are resistant to becoming trapped in local optima
11.They perform very well for large-scale optimization problems
12.Can be employed for a wide variety of optimization problems
The limitation of genetic algorithm includes,
1. The problem of identifying fitness function
2. Definition of representation for the problem
3. Premature convergence occurs

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4. The problem of choosing the various parameters like the size of the
population, mutation rate, cross over rate, the selection method and its
strength.
5. Cannot easily incorporate problem specific information
6. Not good at identifying local optima
7. No effective terminator.
8. Have trouble finding the exact global optimum
9. Require large number of response (fitness) function evaluations
1.6 Applications of Genetic Algorithm
Genetic algorithms have been used in many applications such as:
1. Nonlinear dynamical systems–predicting, data analysis
2. Robot trajectory planning
3. Strategy planning
4. Finding shape of protein molecules
5. Functions for creating images
6. Control–gas pipeline, pole balancing, missile evasion, pursuit
7. Design–semiconductor layout, aircraft design, keyboard
configuration, communication networks
8. Scheduling–manufacturing, facility scheduling, resource allocation
9. Machine Learning–Designing neural networks, both architecture and
weights, improving classification algorithms, classifier systems
10. Signal Processing–filter design
11. Combinatorial Optimization–set covering, traveling salesman (TSP),
Sequence scheduling, routing, bin packing, graph coloring and
partitioning