This is the proceedings of the "8th IMACS Seminar on Monte Carlo Methods" held from August 29 to September 2, 2011 in Borovets, Bulgaria, and organized by the Institute of Information and Communication Technologies of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences in cooperation with the International Association for Mathematics and Computers in Simulation (IMACS). Included are 24 papers which cover all topics presented in the sessions of the seminar: stochastic computation and complexity of high dimensional problems, sensitivity analysis, high-performance computations for Monte Carlo applications, stochastic metaheuristics for optimization problems, sequential Monte Carlo methods for large-scale problems, semiconductor devices and nanostructures. The history of the IMACS Seminar on Monte Carlo Methods goes back to April 1997 when the first MCM Seminar was organized in Brussels: 1st IMACS Seminar, 1997, Brussels, Belgium 2nd IMACS Seminar, 1999, Varna, Bulgaria 3rd IMACS Seminar, 2001, Salzburg, Austria 4th IMACS Seminar, 2003, Berlin, Germany 5th IMACS Seminar, 2005, Tallahassee, USA 6th IMACS Seminar, 2007, Reading, UK 7th IMACS Seminar, 2009, Brussels, Belgium 8th IMACS Seminar, 2011, Borovets, Bulgaria

This book focuses on the aspects related to the parallelization of evolutionary computations, such as parallel genetic operators, parallel fitness evaluation, distributed genetic algorithms, and parallel hardware implementations, as well as on their impact on several applications. It offers a wide spectrum of sample works developed in leading research about parallel implementations of efficient techniques at the heart of computational intelligence.

Metaheuristic Procedures for Training Neural Networks provides successful implementations of metaheuristic methods for neural network training. Moreover, the basic principles and fundamental ideas given in the book will allow the readers to create successful training methods on their own. Apart from Chapter 1, which reviews classical training methods, the chapters are divided into three main categories. The first one is devoted to local search based methods, including Simulated Annealing, Tabu Search, and Variable Neighborhood Search. The second part of the book presents population based methods, such as Estimation Distribution algorithms, Scatter Search, and Genetic Algorithms. The third part covers other advanced techniques, such as Ant Colony Optimization, Co-evolutionary methods, GRASP, and Memetic algorithms. Overall, the book's objective is engineered to provide a broad coverage of the concepts, methods, and tools of this important area of ANNs within the realm of continuous optimization.

Cellular Genetic Algorithms defines a new class of optimization algorithms based on the concepts of structured populations and Genetic Algorithms (GAs). The authors explain and demonstrate the validity of these cellular genetic algorithms throughout the book. This class of genetic algorithms is shown to produce impressive results on a whole range of domains, including complex problems that are epistatic, multi-modal, deceptive, discrete, continuous, multi-objective, and random in nature. The focus of this book is twofold. On the one hand, the authors present new algorithmic models and extensions to the basic class of Cellular GAs in order to tackle complex problems more efficiently. On the other hand, practical real world tasks are successfully faced by applying Cellular GA methodologies to produce workable solutions of real-world applications. These methods can include local search (memetic algorithms), cooperation, parallelism, multi-objective, estimations of distributions, and self-adaptive ideas to extend their applicability. The methods are benchmarked against well-known metaheutistics like Genetic Algorithms, Tabu Search, heterogeneous GAs, Estimation of Distribution Algorithms, etc. Also, a publicly available software tool is offered to reduce the learning curve in applying these techniques. The three final chapters will use the classic problem of vehicle routing and the hot topics of ad-hoc mobile networks and DNA genome sequencing to clearly illustrate and demonstrate the power and utility of these algorithms.

This book is an updated effort in summarizing the trending topics and new hot research lines in solving dynamic problems using metaheuristics. An analysis of the present state in solving complex problems quickly draws a clear picture: problems that change in time, having noise and uncertainties in their definition are becoming very important. The tools to face these problems are still to be built, since existing techniques are either slow or inefficient in tracking the many global optima that those problems are presenting to the solver technique. Thus, this book is devoted to include several of the most important advances in solving dynamic problems. Metaheuristics are the more popular tools to this end, and then we can find in the book how to best use genetic algorithms, particle swarm, ant colonies, immune systems, variable neighborhood search, and many other bioinspired techniques. Also, neural network solutions are considered in this book. Both, theory and practice have been addressed in the chapters of the book. Mathematical background and methodological tools in solving this new class of problems and applications are included. From the applications point of view, not just academic benchmarks are dealt with, but also real world applications in logistics and bioinformatics are discussed here. The book then covers theory and practice, as well as discrete versus continuous dynamic optimization, in the aim of creating a fresh and comprehensive volume. This book is targeted to either beginners and experienced practitioners in dynamic optimization, since we took care of devising the chapters in a way that a wide audience could profit from its contents. We hope to offer a single source for up-to-date information in dynamic optimization, an inspiring and attractive new research domain that appeared in these last years and is here to stay.

This book is the result of several years of research trying to better characterize parallel genetic algorithms (pGAs) as a powerful tool for optimization, search, and learning. Readers can learn how to solve complex tasks by reducing their high computational times. Dealing with two scientific fields (parallelism and GAs) is always difficult, and the book seeks at gracefully introducing from basic concepts to advanced topics.

The presentation is structured in three parts. The first one is targeted to the algorithms themselves, discussing their components, the physical parallelism, and best practices in using and evaluating them. A second part deals with the theory for pGAs, with an eye on theory-to-practice issues. A final third part offers a very wide study of pGAs as practical problem solvers, addressing domains such as natural language processing, circuits design, scheduling, and genomics.

This volume will be helpful both for researchers and practitioners. The first part shows pGAs to either beginners and mature researchers looking for a unified view of the two fields: GAs and parallelism. The second part partially solves (and also opens) new investigation lines in theory of pGAs. The third part can be accessed independently for readers interested in applications. The result is an excellent source of information on the state of the art and future developments in parallel GAs.

This book highlights recent advances in intelligent data analysis, computational intelligence, signal processing, and all associated applications of artificial intelligence. It gathers papers presented at the ECC 2017, the Fourth Euro-China Conference on Intelligent Data Analysis and Applications. The aim of the ECC was to provide an internationally respected forum for scientific research in the broad areas of intelligent data analysis, computational intelligence, signal processing, and all associated applications of artificial intelligence (AI). The fourth installment of the ECC was jointly organized by the University of Malaga, Spain; the VSB - Technical University of Ostrava, Czech Republic; and Fujian University of Technology, Fuzhou, China. The conference took place in Malaga, Spain on October 9-11, 2017.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the second International Conference on Smart Cities, Smart-CT 2017, held in Malaga, Spain, in June 2017. The 16 papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 21 submissions. The topics covered include studies and tools to improve road traffic, energy consumption, logistics, frameworks to provide new services and take decisions in a holistic way, driving assistance, electric vehicles, public transport, and surveys on smart city concepts.

This book is an updated effort in summarizing the trending topics and new hot research lines in solving dynamic problems using metaheuristics. An analysis of the present state in solving complex problems quickly draws a clear picture: problems that change in time, having noise and uncertainties in their definition are becoming very important. The tools to face these problems are still to be built, since existing techniques are either slow or inefficient in tracking the many global optima that those problems are presenting to the solver technique. Thus, this book is devoted to include several of the most important advances in solving dynamic problems. Metaheuristics are the more popular tools to this end, and then we can find in the book how to best use genetic algorithms, particle swarm, ant colonies, immune systems, variable neighborhood search, and many other bioinspired techniques. Also, neural network solutions are considered in this book. Both, theory and practice have been addressed in the chapters of the book. Mathematical background and methodological tools in solving this new class of problems and applications are included. From the applications point of view, not just academic benchmarks are dealt with, but also real world applications in logistics and bioinformatics are discussed here. The book then covers theory and practice, as well as discrete versus continuous dynamic optimization, in the aim of creating a fresh and comprehensive volume. This book is targeted to either beginners and experienced practitioners in dynamic optimization, since we took care of devising the chapters in a way that a wide audience could profit from its contents. We hope to offer a single source for up-to-date information in dynamic optimization, an inspiring and attractive new research domain that appeared in these last years and is here to stay.

This book is the result of several years of research trying to better characterize parallel genetic algorithms (pGAs) as a powerful tool for optimization, search, and learning. Readers can learn how to solve complex tasks by reducing their high computational times. Dealing with two scientific fields (parallelism and GAs) is always difficult, and the book seeks at gracefully introducing from basic concepts to advanced topics. The presentation is structured in three parts. The first one is targeted to the algorithms themselves, discussing their components, the physical parallelism, and best practices in using and evaluating them. A second part deals with the theory for pGAs, with an eye on theory-to-practice issues. A final third part offers a very wide study of pGAs as practical problem solvers, addressing domains such as natural language processing, circuits design, scheduling, and genomics. This volume will be helpful both for researchers and practitioners. The first part shows pGAs to either beginners and mature researchers looking for a unified view of the two fields: GAs and parallelism. The second part partially solves (and also opens) new investigation lines in theory of pGAs. The third part can be accessed independently for readers interested in applications. The result is an excellent source of information on the state of the art and future developments in parallel GAs.

Cellular Genetic Algorithms defines a new class of optimization algorithms based on the concepts of structured populations and Genetic Algorithms (GAs). The authors explain and demonstrate the validity of these cellular genetic algorithms throughout the book with equal and parallel emphasis on both theory and practice. This book is a key source for studying and designing cellular GAs, as well as a self-contained primary reference book for these algorithms.

This book provides successful implementations of metaheuristic methods for neural network training. It is the first book to achieve this objective. Moreover, the basic principles and fundamental ideas given in the book will allow the readers to create successful training methods on their own. Overall, the book's aim is to provide a broad coverage of the concepts, methods, and tools of the important area of ANNs within the realm of continuous optimization.

"Parallel Evolutionary Computation" focuses on the aspects related to the parallelization of evolutionary computations, such as parallel genetic operators, parallel fitness evaluation, distributed genetic algorithms, and parallel hardware implementations, as well as on their impact on several applications.
The book is divided into four parts. The first part deals with a clear software-like and algorithmic vision on parallel evolutionary optimizations. The second part is about hardware implementations of genetic algorithms, a valuable topic which is hard to find in the present literature. The third part treats the problem of distributed evolutionary computation and presents three interesting applications wherein parallel EC new ideas are featured. Finally, the last part deals with the up-to-date field of parallel particle swarm optimization to illustrate the intrinsic similarities and potential extensions to techniques in this domain. The book offers a wide spectrum of sample works developed in leading research throughout the world about parallel implementations of efficient techniques at the heart of computational intelligence. It will be useful both for beginners and experienced researchers in the field of computational intelligence.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 19th Conference of the Spanish Association for Artificial Intelligence, CAEPIA 2020, which was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, amalgamated with CAEPIA 2021, and held in Malaga, Spain, during September 2021. The 25 full papers presented were carefully selected from 40 submissions. The Conference of the Spanish Association of Artificial Intelligence (CAEPIA) is a biennial forum open to researchers from all over the world to present and discuss their latest scientific and technological advances in Antificial Intelligence (AI). The book is subdivided into the following topical headings: machine learning, optimization and search, and real-world applications. It covers such themes as ambient intelligence and smart environments; computer vision and robotics; constraints, search and planning; creativity and A.I.; education and A.I.; explainable and responsible A.I.; foundation, models and applications of A.I, and others.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the First International Conference on Smart Cities, Smart-CT 2016, held in Malaga, Spain, in June 2016. The 16 papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 28 submissions. They topics covered include studies and tools to improve road traffic, energy consumption, logistics, frameworks to provide new services and take decisions in a holistic way, driving assistance, electric vehicles, public transport, and surveys on smart city concepts.