Verifying the effectiveness of an evolutionary approach in solving many-objective optimization problems

Abstract

Most approaches in the evolutionary multi-objective optimization were found to be vulnerable in solving many-objective optimization problems (four or more objectives). This is mainly due to the fact that these algorithms lack from ability to handle more than three objectives adequately. For this reason, researchers have been focusing in developing algorithms capable of addressing many-objective optimization problems. Recently, authors of the Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm-II (NSGA-II) have proposed an extension of this approach, called NSGA-III. This new approach has opened new directions for research and development to solve many-objective optimization problems. In this algorithm the maintenance of diversity among population members is aided by supplying a number of well-spread reference points. In this work, a comparative study of the performance of NSGA-II and NSGA-III was carried out. Our aim is to verify the effectiveness of NSGA-III to deal with many-objectives problems and extend the range of problems that this approach can solve. For this, the comparison was made addressing the project portfolio problem, using instances with three and nine objectives.