Leaders and followers algorithm for constrained non-linear optimization

Abstract

Leaders and Followers algorithm was a novel metaheuristics proposed by Yasser Gonzalez-Fernandez and Stephen Chen. In solving unconstrained optimization, it performed better exploration than other well-known metaheuristics, e.g. Genetic Algorithm, Particle Swarm Optimization and Differential Evolution. Therefore, it performed well in multi-modal problems. In this paper, Leaders and Followers was modified for constrained non-linear optimization. Several well-known benchmark problems for constrained optimization were used to evaluate the proposed algorithm. The result of the evaluation showed that the proposed algorithm consistently and successfully found the optimal solution of low dimensional constrained optimization problems and high dimensional optimization with high number of linear inequality constraint only. Moreover, the proposed algorithm had difficulty in solving high dimensional optimization problem with non-linear constraints and any problem which has more than one equality constraint. In the comparison with other metaheuristics, Leaders and Followers had better performance in overall benchmark problems.