Parallel Approaches for the Artificial Bee Colony Algorithm

Abstract

This work investigates the parallelization of the Artificial Bee Colony Algorithm. Besides a sequential version enhanced with local search, we compare three parallel models: master-slave, multi-hive with migrations, and hybrid hierarchical. Extensive experiments were done using three numerical benchmark functions with a high number of variables. Statistical results indicate that intensive local search improves the quality of solutions found and, thanks to the coevolution effect, the multi-population approaches obtain better quality with less computational effort. A final comparison between models was done analyzing the trade-offs between quality of solution and processing time.