A novel hybrid bacteria-chemotaxis spiral-dynamic algorithm with application to modelling of flexible systems

This paper presents a novel hybrid optimisation algorithm namely HBCSD, which synergises a bacterial foraging algorithm (BFA) and spiral dynamics algorithm (SDA). The main objective of this strategy is to develop an algorithm that is capable to reach a global optimum point at the end of the final solution with a faster convergence speed compared to its predecessor algorithms. The BFA is incorporated into the algorithm to act as a global search or exploration phase. The solutions from the exploration phase then feed into SDA, which acts as a local search or exploitation phase. The proposed algorithm is used in dynamic modelling of two types of flexible systems, namely a flexible robot manipulator and a twin rotor system. The results obtained show that the proposed algorithm outperforms its predecessor algorithms in terms of fitness accuracy, convergence speed, and time-domain and frequency-domain dynamic characterisation of the two flexible systems. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd

Modern Optimization Techniques for PID Parameters of Electrohydraulic Servo Control System

Electrohydraulic servo system has been used in industry in a wide number of applications. Its dynamics are highly nonlinear and also have large extent of model uncertainties and external disturbances. In order to in-crease the reliability, controllability and utilizing the superior speed of response achievable from electrohydraulic systems, further research is required to develop a control software has the ability of overcoming the problems of system nonlinearities. In This paper, a Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) controller is designed and attached to electrohydraulic servo actuator system to control its stability. The PID parameters are optimized by using four techniques: Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), Bacteria Foraging Algorithm (BFA), Genetic Algorithm (GA), and Ant colony optimization (ACO). The simulation results show that the steady-state error of system is eliminated; the rapidity is enhanced by PSO applied on Proportional Integral Derivative (PPID), Bacteria Foraging Algorithm applied on Proportional Integral Derivative (BPID), GA applied on Proportional Integral Derivative (GPID), and ACO Algorithm applied on Proportional Integral Derivative (ACO-PID) controllers when the system parameter variation was happened, and has good performances using in real applications. A comparative study between used modern optimization techniques are described in the paper and the tradeoff between them

Optimisation algorithms inspired from modelling of bacterial foraging patterns and their applications

Research in biologically-inspired optimisation has been fl<;lurishing over the past decades. This approach adopts a bott0!ll-up viewpoint to understand and mimic certain features of a biological system. It has been proved useful in developing nondeterministic algorithms, such as Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs) and Swarm Intelligence (SI). Bacteria, as the simplest creature in nature, are of particular interest in recent studies. In the past thousands of millions of years, bacteria have exhibited a self-organising behaviour to cope with the natural selection. For example, bacteria have developed a number of strategies to search for food sources with a very efficient manner. This thesis explores the potential of understanding of a biological system by modelling the' underlying mechanisms of bacterial foraging patterns and investigates their applicability to engineering optimisation problems. :rvlodelling plays a significant role in understanding bacterial foraging behaviour. Mathematical expressions and experimental observations have been utilised to represent biological systems. However, difficulties arise from the lack of systematic analysis of the developed models and experimental data. Recently, Systems Biology has be,en proposed to overcome this barrier, with the effort from a number of research fields, including Computer Science and Systems Engineering. At the same time, Individual-based Modelling (IbM) has emerged to assist the modelling of a biological system. Starting from a basic model of foraging and proliferation of bacteria, the development of an IbM of bacterial systems of this thesis focuses on a Varying Environment BActerial Model (VEBAM). Simulation results demonstrate that VEBAM is able to provide a new perspective to describe interactions between the bacteria and their food environment. Knowledge transfer from modelling of bacterial systems to solving optimisation problems also composes an important part of this study. Three Bacteriainspired Algorithms (BalAs) have been developed to bridge the gap between modelling and optimisation. These algorithms make use of the. self-adaptability of individual bacteria in the group searching activities described in VEBAM, while incorporating a variety of additional features. In particular, the new bacterial foraging algorithm with varying population (BFAVP) takes bacterial metabolism into consideration. The group behaviour in Particle Swarm Optimiser (PSO) is adopted in Bacterial Swarming Algorithm (BSA) to enhance searching ability. To reduce computational time, another algorithm, a Paired-bacteria Optimiser (PBO) is designed specifically to further explore the capability of BalAs. Simulation studies undertaken against a wide range of benchmark functions demonstrate a satisfying performance with a reasonable convergence speed. To explore the potential of bacterial searching ability in optimisation undertaken in a varying environment, a dynamic bacterial foraging algorithm (DBFA) is developed with the aim of solving optimisation in a time-varying environment. In this case, the balance between its convergence and exploration abilities is investigated, and a new scheme of reproduction is developed which is different froin that used for static optimisation problems. The simulation studies have been undertaken and the results show that the DBFA can adapt to various environmental changes rapidly. One of the challenging large-scale complex optimisation problems is optimal power flow (OPF) computation. BFAVP shows its advantage in solving this problem. A simulation study has been performed on an IEEE 30-bus system, and the results are compared with PSO algorithm and Fast Evolutionary Programming (FEP) algorithm, respectively. Furthermore, the OPF problem is extended for consideration in varying environments, on which DBFA has been evaluated. A simulation study has been undertaken on both the IEEE 30-bus system and the IEEE l1S-bus system, in compariso~ with a number of existing algorithms. The dynamic OPF problem has been tackled for the first time in the area of power systems, and the results obtained are encouraging, with a significant amount of energy could possibly being saved. Another application of BaIA in this thesis is concerned with estimating optimal parameters of a power transformer winding model using BSA. Compared with Genetic Algorithm (GA), BSA is able to obtain a more satisfying result in modelling the transformer winding, which could not be achieved using a theoretical transfer function model

Optimal controllers design for voltage control in Off-grid hybrid power system

Generally, for remote places extension of grid is uneconomical and difficult. Off-grid hybrid power systems (OGHPS) has  renewable energy sources integrated with conventional sources. OGHPS is very significant as it is the only source of electric supply for remote areas. OGHPS under study  has Induction generator (IG) for wind power generation, Photo-Voltaic source with inverter, Synchronous generator (SG) for Diesel Engine (DE) and load. Over-rated PV-inverter has capacity to supply reactive power.  SG of  DE  has Automatic voltage regulator for excitation control to regulate terminal voltage. Load and IG demands reactive power, causes reactive power imbalance hence voltage fluctuations in OGHPS. To manage reactive power for voltage control, two control structures with Proportional–Integral controller(PI), to control  inverter reactive power and  SG excitation by automatic voltage regulator are incorporated.  Improper tuning of controllers lead  to oscillatory and sluggish response. Hence in this test system both controllers need to be tune optimally. This paper proposes novel intelligent computing algorithm , Enhanced Bacterial forging algorithm (EBFA) for optimal reactive power controller for voltage control in OGHPS. Small signal model of OGHPS with proposed controller is  tested for different disturbances. simulation results  are compared  with conventional  method , proved the effectiveness of EBFA

Sub-transmission sub-station expansion planning based on bacterial foraging optimization algorithm

In recent years, significant research efforts have been devoted to the optimal planning of power systems. Substation Expansion Planning (SEP) as a sub-system of power system planning consists of finding the most economical solution with the optimal location and size of future substations and/or feeders to meet the future load demand. The large number of design variables and combination of discrete and continuous variables make the substation expansion planning a very challenging problem. So far, various methods have been presented to solve such a complicated problem. Since the Bacterial Foraging Optimization Algorithm (BFOA) yield to proper results in power system studies, and it has not been applied to SEP in sub-transmission voltage level problems yet, this paper develops a new BFO-based method to solve the Sub-Transmission Substation Expansion Planning (STSEP) problem. The technique discussed in this paper uses BFOA to simultaneously optimize the sizes and locations of both the existing and new installed substations and feeders by considering reliability constraints. To clarify the capabilities of the presented method, two test systems (a typical network and a real ones) are considered, and the results of applying GA and BFOA on these networks are compared. The simulation results demonstrate that the BFOA has the potential to find more optimal results than the other algorithm under the same conditions. Also, the fast convergence, consideration of real-world networks limitations as problem constraints, and the simplicity in applying it to real networks are the main features of the proposed method

Binary Multi-Verse Optimization (BMVO) Approaches for Feature Selection

Multi-Verse Optimization (MVO) is one of the newest meta-heuristic optimization algorithms which imitates the theory of Multi-Verse in Physics and resembles the interaction among the various universes. In problem domains like feature selection, the solutions are often constrained to the binary values viz. 0 and 1. With regard to this, in this paper, binary versions of MVO algorithm have been proposed with two prime aims: firstly, to remove redundant and irrelevant features from the dataset and secondly, to achieve better classification accuracy. The proposed binary versions use the concept of transformation functions for the mapping of a continuous version of the MVO algorithm to its binary versions. For carrying out the experiments, 21 diverse datasets have been used to compare the Binary MVO (BMVO) with some binary versions of existing metaheuristic algorithms. It has been observed that the proposed BMVO approaches have outperformed in terms of a number of features selected and the accuracy of the classification process

Investigating bacteroidetes gliding motility

Bacteroidetes gliding motility is a type of surface motility in which rod-shaped bacteria move up to 2 µm s in a corkscrewing motion. Flavobacterium johnsoniae is the primary model organism for the study of Bacteroidetes gliding. SprB is the main adhesin in this organism and moves in a helix along the cell surface. This movement is guided by an underlying track that is anchored to the inner leaflet of the outer membrane. The essential gliding lipoprotein GldJ, which is helically arranged when visualised in fixed cells, is suggested to form this track. However, direct in vivo imaging of GldJ is yet to be achieved. Two currently outstanding questions about Bacteroidetes gliding motility are 1) how adhesion of SprB to the substratum is controlled so that binding only occurs when moving from the leading to the lagging cell pole and 2) how/if the cell discriminate between the poles. In this thesis, a fusion of the HaloTag domain to SprB enabled labelling of SprB with stable and bright dyes. The movement of SprB could then be visualised using single-particle tracking to reveal the underlying track topology. These tracking data suggest that the underlying track is not a single closed loop currently proposed, but rather a complex and potentially dynamic structure that can form multiple loops and cover most of the cell surface. SprB is encoded by the sprB operon that further encodes RemFG, Fjoh_0982, and SprCDF. In this thesis I show that all these components, except fjoh_0982, are required for gliding motility but only sprF are required for SprB helical movement. All the sprB operon components required for gliding are also required for SprB-mediated attachment to glass, indicating that they regulate adhesion of SprB. RemG and SprCD move in a helix reminiscent of the SprB movement pattern. The helical movement does not depend on SprF or SprB, but rather on the SprFhomologous N-terminal domain of SprD. Observations of gliding cells with fluorescently labelled SprC revealed accumulation of SprC near the leading cell pole. This polar accumulation correlated with the direction of movement and was not observed in cells that did not move. Furthermore, a mutant lacking the C-terminal 50 residues of SprD was unable to accumulate SprC at the leading pole. SprB did not show a similar asymmetric distribution in gliding cells. Fluorescence microscopy shows that helically moving sprB operon proteins accumulate at midcell in dividing cells in a GldJ dependent manner. Cross-linking mass spectrometry indicates that GldJ interacts with the sprB operon proteins as well as GldKNO, essential outer membrane components of the type 9 secretion system which is a pre-requisite for Bacteroidetes gliding motility