Adaptive variable space differential evolution algorithm based on population distribution

A novel memetic computing optimization algorithms, i.e. an adaptive variable space differential evolution algorithm (AVSDE), is proposed to improve the global optimization performance. AVSDE guides most individuals search in adaptive variable space (AVS) and employs adaptive mutation and adaptive control parameter. In AVSDE, AVS is determined by population global distribution information, and DE’s operators depend on the local information of the distance and direction. The performance of AVSDE is improved by integrating the global information with the local information. In addition, different mutation strategies are selected according to the evolution stage and random probability to balance AVSDE’s exploration and exploitation abilities, and adaptive control parameter is used to further enhance the performance of AVSDE. 19 scalable benchmark functions are employed to demonstrate the performance of AVSDE. Comparing with two well-tuned conventional DE and several state$$-$$of-the$$-$$art parameter adaptive DE variants, the whole performance of AVSDE is the best. Finally, two experiments are conducted to analyze the effect of the key parameters on AVSDE’s performance, and the optimal parameters are obtained.