The physics that result in the decoupling of a molecule from a bosonic solvent at 0 K are studied. Fixed-node diffusion Monte Carlo (FNDMC) coupled with a Genetic Algorithm is used to perform simulations of the bosonic droplets doped with various molecules. The efficacy and accuracy of this approach is tested on a strongly coupled 2-dimensional quartic oscillator with excellent results. This algorithm is then applied to 4He-CO and 4He-HCN clusters respectively in an effort to determine the factors that result in the onset of microscopic superfluidity. The decoupling of the doped molecule from the bosonic solvent is found to be, primarily, a result of the combined effect of the repulsive interaction between the helium atoms and bose symmetry. The effects of rotor size versus molecular anisotropy in a NH3 molecule seeded into a 4He droplet is studied as well. Simulations are done using the accurate rotational constants (B0=9.945 cm-1, C0=6.229 cm-1) and using "fudged" versions of the rotational constants (Bfudged=0.9945 cm-1, Cfudged=0.6229 cm-1) for the |0011〉state. The simulations done with the fudged rotational constants experience a slightly smaller reduction than those done using the accurate rotational constants. This is attributed to the importance of molecular anisotropy versus the size of larger rotational constants in molecules whose rotational constants fall in an intermediate regime.

In this research, we investigate and propose new operators to improve Genetic Algorithm’s performance to solve the multi-stop routing problem. In a multi-stop route, a user starts at point x, visits all destinations exactly once, and then return to the same starting point. In this thesis, we are interested in two types of this problem. The first type is when the distance among destinations is fixed. In this case, it is called static traveling salesman problem. The second type is when the cost among destinations is affected by traffic congestion. Thus, the time among destinations changes during the day. In this case, it is called time-dependent traveling salesman problem. This research proposes new improvements on genetic algorithm to solve each of these two optimization problems. First, the Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP) is one of the most important and attractive combinatorial optimization problems. There are many meta-heuristic algorithms that can solve this problem. In this paper, we use a Genetic Algorithm (GA) to solve it. GA uses different operators: selection, crossover, and mutation. Sequential Constructive Crossover (SCX) and Bidirectional Circular Constructive Crossover (BCSCX) are efficient to solve TSP. Here, we propose a modification to these crossovers. The experimental results show that our proposed adjustment is superior to SCX and BCSCX as well as to other conventional crossovers (e.g. Order Crossover (OX), Cycle Crossover (CX), and Partially Mapped Crossover (PMX)) in term of solution quality and convergence speed. Furthermore, the GA solver, that is improved by applying inexpensive local search operators, can produce solutions that have much better quality within reasonable computational time. Second, the Time-Dependent Traveling Salesman Problem (TDTSP) is an interesting problem and has an impact on real-life applications such as a delivery system. In this problem, time among destinations fluctuates during the day due to traffic, weather, accidents, or other events. Thus, it is important to recommend a tour that can save driver’s time and resources. In this research, we propose a Multi-Population Genetic Algorithm (MGA) where each population has different crossovers. We compare the proposed MG against Single-Population Genetic Algorithm (SGA) in terms of tour time solution quality. Our finding is that MGA outperforms SGA. Our method is tested against real-world traffic data [1] where there are 200 different instances with different numbers of destinations. For all tested instances, MGA is superior on average by at least 10% (for instances with size less than 50) and 20% (for instances of size 50) better tour time solution compared to SGA with OX and SGA with PMX operators, and at least 4% better tour time compared toga with SCX operator.

[pt] A Nanotecnologia teve seus primeiros conceitos introduzidos pelo físico americano Richard Feynman em 1959, em sua famosa palestra intitulada There´s plenty of room at the bottom (Ainda há muito espaço sobrando no fundo). Já a Inteligência Computacional tem sido utilizada com sucesso em diversas áreas no meio acadêmico e industrial. Este trabalho investiga o potencial dos Algoritmos Genéticos na otimização e síntese de dispositivos e estruturas na área de Nanotecnologia, através de 3 tipos de aplicações distintas: síntese de circuitos eletrônicos moleculares, projeto de novos polímeros condutores e otimização de parâmetros de OLEDs (Organic Light-Emitting Diodes). A síntese de circuitos eletrônicos moleculares é desenvolvida com base em Hardware Evolucionário (EHW - Evolvable Hardware) e tem como principais elementos dois dispositivos moleculares simulados em SPICE: o diodo molecular e o transistor molecular. O projeto de novos polímeros condutores é baseado em uma metodologia que combina uma aproximação tight-binding (hamiltoniano de Hückel simplificado) que representa a estrutura eletrônica de uma cadeia polimérica, empregando um AG com avaliação distribuída como mecanismo de síntese. Finalmente, a otimização de parâmetros de OLEDs é desenvolvida por meio de um método que modela o comportamento elétrico do dispositivo com multicamadas, onde cada camada possui uma proporção de MTE (material transportador de elétrons) e uma proporção de MTB (material transportador de buracos). As aplicações apresentam resultados que comprovam que o apoio de técnicas de Inteligência Computacional como os Algoritmos Genéticos no mundo nanométrico pode trazer benefícios para a criação e o desenvolvimento de novas tecnologias. / [en] The first Nanotechnology concepts were introduced by the American physicist Richard Feynman in 1959, in his famous lecture entitled There´s plenty of room at the bottom. Computational Intelligence has been successfully used in various areas in the academic and industrial worlds. This work investigates the potential of Genetic Algorithms in the optimization and synthesis of devices and structures in the Nanotechnology domain, by means of 3 types of distinct applications: synthesis of molecular electronic circuits, design of new conducting polymers and optimization of OLEDs (Organic Light-Emitting Diodes) parameters. The synthesis of molecular electronic circuits is developed based on the Evolvable Hardware (EHW) paradigm and has as main elements two molecular devices simulated in SPICE: the molecular diode and the molecular transistor. The design of new conducting polymers is based on a methodology that combines an approximated tight-binding (simplified Huckel Hamiltonian) that represents the electronic structure of a polymer chain, using a GA with distributed evaluation as the synthesis mechanism. Finally, the optimization of OLEDs parameters is developed by means of a method that models the electric behavior of multi-layer devices, where each layer has a ratio of electron transport material (ETM) to hole transport material (HTM). The applications present results that demonstrate that the use of Computational Intelligence techniques, as Genetic Algorithms, in the nanometer world can bring benefits for the creation and development of new technologies.

Evolvable Hardware is a technique derived from evolutionary computation applied to a hardware design. The term evolutionary computation involves similar steps as involved in the human evolution. It has been given names in accordance with the electronic technology like, Genetic Algorithm (GA), Evolutionary Strategy (ES) and Genetic Programming (GP). In evolutionary computing, a configured bit is considered as a human chromosome for a genetic algorithm, which has to be downloaded into hardware. Early evolvable hardware experiments were conducted in simulation and the only elite chromosome was downloaded to the hardware, which was labelled as Extrinsic Hardware. With the invent of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) and Reconfigurable Processing Units (RPUs), it is now possible for the implementation solutions to be fast enough to evaluate a real hardware circuit within an evolutionary computation framework; this is called an Intrinsic Evolvable Hardware. This research has been taken in continuation with project 'Evolvable Hardware' done at Manukau Institute of Technology (MIT). The project was able to manually evolve two simple electronic circuits of NAND and NOR gates in simulation. In relation to the project done at MIT this research focuses on the following: To automate the simulation by using In Circuit Debugging Emulators (IDEs), and to develop a strategy of configuring hardware like an FPGA without the use of their company supplied in circuit debugging emulators, so that the evolution of an intrinsic evolvable hardware could be controlled, and is hardware independent. As mentioned, the research conducted here was able to develop an evolvable hardware friendly Generic Structure which could be used for the development of evolvable hardware. The structure developed was hardware independent and was able to run on various FPGA hardware’s for the purpose of intrinsic evolution. The structure developed used few configuration bits as compared to current evolvable hardware designs.

In this study, an improved bit-array representation method for structural topology optimization using the Genetic Algorithm (GA) is proposed. The issue of representation degeneracy is fully addressed and the importance of structural connectivity in a design is further emphasized. To evaluate the constrained objective function, Deb's constraint handling approach is further developed to ensure that feasible individuals are always better than infeasible ones in the population to improve the efficiency of the GA. A hierarchical violation penalty method is proposed to drive the GA search towards the topologies with higher structural performance, less unusable material and fewer separate objects in the design domain in a hierarchical manner. Numerical results of structural topology optimization problems of minimum weight and minimum compliance designs show the success of this novel bit-array representation method and suggest that the GA performance can be significantly improved by handling the design connectivity properly. / Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA)

A flexible workcell controller has been developed using a three level control hierarchy (workcell, workstation, equipment). The cell controller is automatically generated from a model input by the user. The model consists of three sets of graphs. One set of graphs describes the process plans of the parts produced by the manufacturing system, one set describes movements into, out of and within workstations, and the third set describes movements of parts/transporters between workstations. The controller uses an event driven Petri net to maintain state information and to communicate with lower level controllers. The control logic is contained in an artificial neural network. The Petri net state information is used as the input to the neural net and messages that are Petri net events are output from the neural net. A genetic algorithm was used to search over alternative operation choices to find a "good" solution. The system was fully implemented and several test cases are described.

The objective of the cellular manufacturing is to simplify the management of the manufacturing industries. In regrouping the production of different parts into clusters, the management of the manufacturing is reduced to manage different small entities. One of the most important problems in the cellular manufacturing is the design of these entities called cells. These cells represent a cluster of machines that can be dedicated to the production of one or several parts. The ideal design of a cellular manufacturing is to make these cells totally independent from one another, i.e. that each part is dedicated to only one cell (i.e. if it can be achieved completely inside this cell). The reality is a little more complex. Once the cells are created, there exists still some traffic between them. This traffic corresponds to a transfer of a part between two machines belonging to different cells. The final objective is to reduce this traffic between the cells (called inter-cellular traffic). Different methods exist to produce these cells and dedicated them to parts. To create independent cells, the choice can be done between different ways to produce each part. Two interdependent problems must be solved: • the allocation of each operation on a machine: each part is defined by one or several sequences of operations and each of them can be achieved by a set of machines. A final sequence of machines must be chosen to produce each part. • the grouping of each machine in cells producing traffic inside and outside the cells. In function of the solution to the first problem, different clusters will be created to minimise the inter-cellular traffic. In this thesis, an original method based on the grouping genetic algorithm (Gga) is proposed to solve simultaneously these two interdependent problems. The efficiency of the method is highlighted compared to the methods based on two integrated algorithms or heuristics. Indeed, to form these cells of machines with the allocation of operations on the machines, the used methods permitting to solve large scale problems are generally composed by two nested algorithms. The main one calls the secondary one to complete the first part of the solution. The application domain goes beyond the manufacturing industry and can for example be applied to the design of the electronic systems as explained in the future research.

Skid-steer loaders are also called mini loaders. Skid-steer loaders are capable of zero turning radiuses, which make them extremely maneuverable and suitable for confined spaces. The aim of this thesis study is to design the loader mechanism for skid-steer loaders. Primarily, the loader mechanism synthesis will be performed to determine the basic link dimensions for the mechanism of the loader. Genetic algorithm will be used in the design process. Besides, the hydraulic cylinders dimensions and working pressure of the loader mechanism will be chosen according to the forces that will be applied. After the link dimensions of the loader are determined, 3D modeling of the loader mechanism will be performed. Afterwards, the finite element analysis of the system will be carried out. Finally, improvements will be made on the model according to the results of the analysis.

Wireless network placement of transmitters, such as base stations for 2G and 3G, access points for WLAN, is a NP-hard problem, since many factors have to be considered, like QoS, coverage, cost, etc. In wireless network placement problem, the goal is to find a set of transmitters which achieves the widest coverage on a given map and spends the minimal cost. In this thesis, we propose a novel variable-length genetic algorithm for solving this problem. Most of existing methods for solving wireless network placement problem, to our best knowledge, users must assign an upper bound or a total number of transmitters for placement. Unlike these existing methods, the proposed algorithm can search the optimal number of transmitters automatically. In addition, the proposed algorithm can find near optimal solutions even in heterogeneous transmitters placement problem, i.e., transmitters with different power radius or cost. The results on several benchmarks are very close to the optimal solutions, which validate the capability of the proposed method in finding the numbers, the types, are the positions of transmitters in heterogeneous wireless network environment.

Many real world problems in science and engineering can be treated as optimization problems with multiple objectives or criteria. The demand for fast and robust stochastic algorithms to cater to the optimization needs is very high. When the cost function for the problem is nonlinear and non-differentiable, direct search approaches are the methods of choice. Many such approaches use the greedy criterion, which is based on accepting the new parameter vector only if it reduces the value of the cost function. This could result in fast convergence, but also in misconvergence where it could lead the vectors to get trapped in local minima. Inherently, parallel search techniques have more exploratory power. These techniques discourage premature convergence and consequently, there are some candidate solution vectors which do not converge to the global minimum solution at any point of time. Rather, they constantly explore the whole search space for other possible solutions. In this thesis, we concentrate on benchmarking three popular algorithms: Real-valued Genetic Algorithm (RGA), Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), and Differential Evolution (DE). The DE algorithm is found to out-perform the other algorithms in fast convergence and in attaining low-cost function values. The DE algorithm is selected and used to build a model for forecasting auroral oval boundaries during a solar storm event. This is compared against an established model by Feldstein and Starkov. As an extended study, the ability of the DE is further put into test in another example of a nonlinear system study, by using it to study and design phase-locked loop circuits. In particular, the algorithm is used to obtain circuit parameters when frequency steps are applied at the input at particular instances.