Discrete Firefly Algorithm for Traveling Salesman Problem: A New Movement Scheme

The "firefly algorithm" (FA) is a nature-inspired technique originally designed for solving continuous optimization problems. There are several existing approaches that apply FA also as a basis for solving discrete optimization problems, in particular the "traveling salesman problem" (TSP). In this chapter, we present a new movement scheme called edge-based movement, an operation which guarantees that a candidate solution more closely resembles another one. This leads to a more FA-like behavior of the algorithm. We investigate the performance of the 'evolutionary discrete firefly algorithm" when using this new edge-based movement and compare it against previous methods. Computer simulations show that the new movement scheme produces slightly better accuracy with much faster average time. The average speedup factor is 14.06 times. © 2013