An improved harmony search algorithm for solving optimization problems

This paper develops an improved harmony search (IHS) algorithm for solving optimization problems. IHS employs a novel method for generating new solution vectors that enhances accuracy and convergence rate of harmony search (HS) algorithm. In this paper the impacts of constant parameters on harmony search algorithm are discussed and a strategy for tuning these parameters is presented. The IHS algorithm has been successfully applied to various benchmarking and standard engineering optimization problems. Numerical results reveal that the proposed algorithm can find better solutions when compared to HS and other heuristic or deterministic methods and is a powerful search algorithm for various engineering optimization problems. (c) 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.