Brock University Home Page

  Evolutionary Computation
(COSC 5P74)

Computer Science Home Page



Fall 2018
Department of Computer Science
Brock University

Instructor: B. M.Ombuki-Berman   E-mail:bombuki@brocku.ca  Office: J307
Office Hours: Tues: 1:00 - 1:50 pm
Lecture time & Room: Tuesday: 2:00 - 5:00 pm, Room: WH 202

Course Outline | Tentative Syllabus | Project description | Seminar Requirements | Announcements/Important Dates | Web resources |

Objective

To provide a broad introduction to the field of Genetic Algorithms and other areas of Evolutionary Computation from a theoretical and application viewpoint. Includes related bio-inspired sub-areas such as swarm intelligence, and evolutionary robotics. To teach students how these paradigms exploit biological processes in nature to solve problems from various application domains.
The course is suitable for students preparing for research in Evolutionary Computation, as well as other students who want to apply Evolutionary Computation techniques to solve problems in their fields of study.

Recommended Readings

Various texts are used in this class, although the Aiben book is used as major reference book for this class. Various Recent relevant journal articles and Recent conference papers will be used for lectures and seminars.

Possible topics may include:

Genetic Algorithms core including representation, operators and architectures. Theoretical analyses, including diversity issues, and fitness landscapes. An overview of
other fields of evolutionary computation including Genetic Programming, Evolutionary Programming, Evolution Strategies, and Classifier Systems. Other nature-inspired global
optimization techniques from swarm intelligence, and evolving neural networks. Exposure to a wide range of practical applications in business, science and engineering.

Grading

The marking scheme is as follows:

Tentative Course Plan (These are winter dates based on 1.5 by 2 meeting per week, schedule different in Fall 2018 but gives idea of topics to cover)

Date Topic Comments

Jan. 7th
 Course overview, biological evolution, What is Evolutionary Computation?

Jan.11th
 Basic principles: Simple Evolutionary strategies

Jan. 14th
 Genetic Algorithms, genetic operators, selection and parameters

Jan. 18th
 Combinatorial Optimization and GAs, Representation schemes

Jan. 21st
Multi-objective Evolutionary Optimisation Assignment 1 announced

Jan. 25th
 Multi-objective Evolutionary Optimisation

Jan.28th
 Parameter control in EC

Feb. 1st
Swarm Intelligence intro., Particle Swarm Optimization

Feb.4th
 Particle Swarm Optimization Assignment 2 announced

Feb.8th
 Swarm intelligence, Ant colony optimization

Feb.11th
 memetic algorithms Assignment 1 due

Feb. 15th
 Genetic Programming

Feb. 18th & Feb. 22nd
Reading Week

Feb. 25th
Search Space Fitness Analysis

March 1st
Co-evolutionary Learning and Speciation

March 4th
Constraint Handling

March 8th
Artificial immune systems Assignment 3 announced

March 11th
Evolving neural networks Assignment 2 due

March 15th
 Class Test

March 18th
 Learning Classifier Systems

MArch 22nd
 Drift Analysis

March 25th
 Evolutionary Robotics

March 29th
Easter Friday: No Class n/a

April 1st
TBA Assignment 3 due

Last Modified: September 30th, 2018 Questions/comments? E-mail B.Ombuki-Berman
Copyright 2018 B. M. Ombuki-Berman