Quantum evolutionary algorithm for multi-robot coalition formation

Abstract

Coalition formation is an important cooperative method in Multi-Robot System, which has been paid more and more attention. However, efficient algorithm for multi-robot coalition is lack of various real-world applications in dynamic unknown environment. In such cases, the optimization algorithm has to track the changing optimum as close as possible, rather than just finding a static appropriate solution. In this paper, The Quantum Evolutionary Algorithm is proposed for solving this problem, where a skillful Quantum probability representation of chromosome coding strategy is designed to adapt to the complexity of the multi-robot coalition formation problem. Furthermore, a strategy for updating quantum gate using the evolutionary equation is employed to avoid the premature convergence. Experiments results show that the proposed algorithm could solve the multi-robot coalition formation problem effectively and efficiently, and the proposed algorithm is valid and superior to other related methods as far as the stability and speed of convergence are concerned.