Effectiveness of solving traveling salesman problem using Ant Colony Optimization on distributed multi-agent middleware

Abstract

Abstract—Recently we have setup the goal of investigating new truly distributed forms of Ant Colony Optimization. We proposed a new distributed approach for Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) algorithms called Ant Colony Optimization on a Distributed Architecture (ACODA). ACODA was designed to allow efficient implementation of ACO algorithms on state-of-the art distributed multi-agent middleware. In this paper we present experimental results that support the feasibility of ACODA by considering a distributed version of the Ant Colony System (ACS). In particular we show the effectiveness of this approach for solving Travel-ing Salesperson Problem by comparing experimental results of ACODA versions of distributed ACS with distributed random searches on a high-speed cluster network. I.