On Applications of New Soft and Evolutionary Computing Techniques to Direct and Inverse Modeling Problems

Adaptive direct modeling or system identification and adaptive inverse modeling or channel equalization find extensive applications in telecommunication, control system, instrumentation, power system engineering and geophysics. If the plants or systems are nonlinear, dynamic, Hammerstein and multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) types, the identification task becomes very difficult. Further, the existing conventional methods like the least mean square (LMS) and recursive least square (RLS) algorithms do not provide satisfactory training to develop accurate direct and inverse models. Very often these (LMS and RLS) derivative based algorithms do not lead to optimal solutions in pole-zero and Hammerstein type system identification problem as they have tendency to be trapped by local minima. In many practical situations the output data are contaminated with impulsive type outliers in addition to measurement noise. The density of the outliers may be up to 50%, which means that about 50% of the available data are affected by outliers. The strength of these outliers may be two to five times the maximum amplitude of the signal. Under such adverse conditions the available learning algorithms are not effective in imparting satisfactory training to update the weights of the adaptive models. As a result the resultant direct and inverse models become inaccurate and improper. Hence there are three important issues which need attention to be resolved. These are : (i) Development of accurate direct and inverse models of complex plants using some novel architecture and new learning techniques. (ii) Development of new training rules which alleviates local minima problem during training and thus help in generating improved adaptive models. (iii) Development of robust training strategy which is less sensitive to outliers in training and thus to create identification and equalization models which are robust against outliers. These issues are addressed in this thesis and corresponding contribution are outlined in seven Chapters. In addition, one Chapter on introduction, another on required architectures and algorithms and last Chapter on conclusion and scope for further research work are embodied in the thesis. A new cascaded low complexity functional link artificial neural network (FLANN) structure is proposed and the corresponding learning algorithm is derived and used to identify nonlinear dynamic plants. In terms of identification performance this model is shown to outperform the multilayer perceptron and FLANN model. A novel method of identification of IIR plants is proposed using comprehensive learning particle swarm optimization (CLPSO) algorithm. It is shown that the new approach is more accurate in identification and takes less CPU time compared to those obtained by existing recursive LMS (RLMS), genetic algorithm (GA) and PSO based approaches. The bacterial foraging optimization (BFO) and PSO are used to develop efficient learning algorithms to train models to identify nonlinear dynamic and MIMO plants. The new scheme takes less computational effort, more accurate and consumes less input samples for training. Robust identification and equalization of complex plants have been carried out using outliers in training sets through minimization of robust norms using PSO and BFO based methods. This method yields robust performance both in equalization and identification tasks. Identification of Hammerstein plants has been achieved successfully using PSO, new clonal PSO (CPSO) and immunized PSO (IPSO) algorithms. Finally the thesis proposes a distributed approach to identification of plants by developing two distributed learning algorithms : incremental PSO and diffusion PSO. It is shown that the new approach is more efficient in terms of accuracy and training time compared to centralized PSO based approach. In addition a robust distributed approach for identification is proposed and its performance has been evaluated. In essence the thesis proposed many new and efficient algorithms and structure for identification and equalization task such as distributed algorithms, robust algorithms, algorithms for ploe-zero identification and Hammerstein models. All these new methods are shown to be better in terms of performance, speed of computation or accuracy of results

Probabilistic Modeling in Dynamic Information Retrieval

Dynamic modeling is used to design systems that are adaptive to their changing environment and is currently poorly understood in information retrieval systems. Common elements in the information retrieval methodology, such as documents, relevance, users and tasks, are dynamic entities that may evolve over the course of several interactions, which is increasingly captured in search log datasets. Conventional frameworks and models in information retrieval treat these elements as static, or only consider local interactivity, without consideration for the optimisation of all potential interactions. Further to this, advances in information retrieval interface, contextual personalization and ad display demand models that can intelligently react to users over time. This thesis proposes a new area of information retrieval research called Dynamic Information Retrieval. The term dynamics is defined and what it means within the context of information retrieval. Three examples of current areas of research in information retrieval which can be described as dynamic are covered: multi-page search, online learning to rank and session search. A probabilistic model for dynamic information retrieval is introduced and analysed, and applied in practical algorithms throughout. This framework is based on the partially observable Markov decision process model, and solved using dynamic programming and the Bellman equation. Comparisons are made against well-established techniques that show improvements in ranking quality and in particular, document diversification. The limitations of this approach are explored and appropriate approximation techniques are investigated, resulting in the development of an efficient multi-armed bandit based ranking algorithm. Finally, the extraction of dynamic behaviour from search logs is also demonstrated as an application, showing that dynamic information retrieval modeling is an effective and versatile tool in state of the art information retrieval research

Advances in Reinforcement Learning

Reinforcement Learning (RL) is a very dynamic area in terms of theory and application. This book brings together many different aspects of the current research on several fields associated to RL which has been growing rapidly, producing a wide variety of learning algorithms for different applications. Based on 24 Chapters, it covers a very broad variety of topics in RL and their application in autonomous systems. A set of chapters in this book provide a general overview of RL while other chapters focus mostly on the applications of RL paradigms: Game Theory, Multi-Agent Theory, Robotic, Networking Technologies, Vehicular Navigation, Medicine and Industrial Logistic

TRIZ Future Conference 2004

TRIZ the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving is a living science and a practical methodology: millions of patents have been examined to look for principles of innovation and patterns of excellence. Large and small companies are using TRIZ to solve problems and to develop strategies for future technologies. The TRIZ Future Conference is the annual meeting of the European TRIZ Association, with contributions from everywhere in the world. The aims of the 2004 edition are the integration of TRIZ with other methodologies and the dissemination of systematic innovation practices even through SMEs: a broad spectrum of subjects in several fields debated with experts, practitioners and TRIZ newcomers

Aerial Vehicles

This book contains 35 chapters written by experts in developing techniques for making aerial vehicles more intelligent, more reliable, more flexible in use, and safer in operation.It will also serve as an inspiration for further improvement of the design and application of aeral vehicles. The advanced techniques and research described here may also be applicable to other high-tech areas such as robotics, avionics, vetronics, and space