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Since the evaluation of each individual is based on the time-consuming structural analysis, the computational efficiency of truss topology optimization using genetic algorithm is very low. The paper focuses on this challenging problem. It is observed that there are a number of duplicate individuals appearing repetitively in the evolutionary process. Therefore, an individual identification technique is introduced to avoid evaluating the duplicate individuals by the time-consuming structural analysis but by searching the evolutionary history data to save computing time, the computational complexity of this technique is deduced. The results of two truss examples verify that the technique can effectively improve the efficiency of the algorithm. Based on this identification technique, numeric experiments are implemented to study the influence of several factors, i.e., the population size, the max generation, and the scale of problems, on the proportion of duplicate individuals. Results show that the population size has a significant impact on the proportion, and that both the max generation and the scale of problems have little influence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]