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As a meta-heuristic algorithm, the ant colony algorithm has been successfully used to solve various combinatorial optimization problems. However, the existing algorithm that takes the power of ants to solve distributed constraint optimization problems (ACO_DCOP) is easy to fall into local optima. To deal with this issue, this paper presents an adaptive ant colony algorithm based on local information entropy to solve distributed constraint optimization problems, named LIEAD. In LIEAD, the local information entropy is introduced to help agents adaptively select the pheromone update strategy and value selection strategy, which improves the convergence speed and the quality of the solution. Moreover, a restart mechanism is designed to break the accumulation state of pheromone, which increases the population diversity and helps the algorithm jump out of the local optima. The extensive experimental results indicate that LIEAD can significantly outperform ACO_DCOP and is competitive with the state-of-the-art DCOPs algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to improve the efficiency and adaptability of cognitive radar jamming decision-making, a fusion algorithm (Ant-QL) based on ant colony and Q-Learning is proposed in this paper. The algorithm does not rely on a priori information and enhances adaptability through real-time interactions between the jammer and the target radar. At the same time, it can be applied to single jammer and multiple jammer countermeasure scenarios with high jamming effects. First, traditional Q-Learning and DQN algorithms are discussed, and a radar jamming decision-making model is built for the simulation verification of each algorithm. Then, an improved Q-Learning algorithm is proposed to address the shortcomings of both algorithms. By introducing the pheromone mechanism of ant colony algorithms in Q-Learning and using the ε -greedy algorithm to balance the contradictory relationship between exploration and exploitation, the algorithm greatly avoids falling into a local optimum, thus accelerating the convergence speed of the algorithm with good stability and robustness in the convergence process. In order to better adapt to the cluster countermeasure environment in future battlefields, the algorithm and model are extended to cluster cooperative jamming decision-making. We map each jammer in the cluster to an intelligent ant searching for the optimal path, and multiple jammers interact with each other to obtain information. During the process of confrontation, the method greatly improves the convergence speed and stability and reduces the need for hardware and power resources of the jammer. Assuming that the number of jammers is three, the experimental simulation results of the convergence speed of the Ant-QL algorithm improve by 85.4%, 80.56% and 72% compared with the Q-Learning, DQN and improved Q-Learning algorithms, respectively. During the convergence process, the Ant-QL algorithm is very stable and efficient, and the algorithm complexity is low. After the algorithms converge, the average response times of the four algorithms are 6.99 × 10−4 s, 2.234 × 10−3 s, 2.21 × 10−4 s and 1.7 × 10−4 s, respectively. The results show that the improved Q-Learning algorithm and Ant-QL algorithm also have more advantages in terms of average response time after convergence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aiming at the problem of slow search speed and insufficient solution quality of ant colony algorithm, this paper proposed an ant colony algorithm combining dynamic hierarchical clustering and neighborhood interval reorganization. In the ini-tial stage, the algorithm adjusted the hierarchical clustering threshold and iterated to the target cluster based on the principle of minimum inter-cluster distance merging, and then merged the clusters according to the pre-merging coefficient. In the next place it used ant colony system to generate subclass paths, disconnected and reorganized the initial paths to improve the overall convergence speed of the algorithm. Then the algorithm used ant colony system to optimize the solution space, and at the same time, carried out neighborhood interval diffusion reorganization between clusters to increase the diversity of solutions. Furthermore, if the quality of the reconstructed solution was better than the current optimization solution at a fixed number of iterations, the recommendation process would be carried out to improve the accuracy of the solution. When the algorithm stagnated, it introduced an adjustment factor to reduce the differences between pheromones of each path to enhance the ant search ability, which could help the algorithm jump out of the local optimal. The experiment result shows that the accuracy of the algorithm is about 3% when facing large-scale problems, which can effectively improve the accuracy and convergence rate of the solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to construct an efficient and reliable global path for unmanned surface vehicles (USVs), this paper proposes a USV global path planning algorithm based on an optimized ant colony algorithm (OACA). The algorithm constructs a USV global path planning model by comprehensively considering energy consumption costs and turning control costs. In order to ensure the adaptability of the model to the task environment, the USV's motion characteristics are analyzed with full consideration of external interference, and on this basis, the characterization of energy consumption costs and turning control costs is completed. In order to obtain the global optimal solution of the model and accelerate the convergence speed of the model, in the initialization process of the ant colony algorithm, the initial pheromone is distributed unevenly by introducing the distance relationship among the intermediate node, the starting point, and ending point to improve the initial search efficiency. In the iterative process of searching for the optimal solution, enhancing the guidance effect of the current optimal solution on the offspring ants by introducing a weight factor to improve the update rule of pheromone, which accelerates the convergence speed of the algorithm. In the last two steps of the deadlock path, the number of lost ants is reduced by introducing a penalty factor to punish the pheromone which can guarantee the diversity of ants, and the algorithm's premature convergence is overcome. The simulation results prove the effectiveness of this algorithm. © 2022 Institute of Electrical Engineers of Japan. Published by Wiley Periodicals LLC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Ant colony algorithm (ACA), inspired by the food-searching behavior of ants, is an evolutionary algorithm and performs well in discrete optimization. In this paper, it is used for fuzzy clustering in image segmentation. Three features such as gray value, gradient and neighborhood of the pixels, are extracted for the searching and clustering process. Unexpectedly, tests show that it is time consuming when dealing with the vast image data. In view of this drawback, improvements have been made by initializing the clustering centers and enhancing the heuristic function to accelerate the searching process. Experiments and comparisons are done to show that the improved ACA-based image segmentation is an efficient and effective approach. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]