GA TOOL OF MATLAB

1. Introduction
Genetic algorithms are stochastic global search and optimization methods that
mimic the metaphor of natural biological evolution . At each generation of a GA, a
new set of approximations is created by the process of selecting individuals
according to their level of fitness in the problem domain and reproducing them
using operators borrowed from natural genetics.
This process leads to the evolution of Population that are better suited to their
environment than the individuals from which they were created.
GAs have been shown to be an effective strategy in the off-line design of control
systems by a number of practitioners.
2. The MATLAB GA Toolbox
While there exist many good public-domain genetic algorithm packages,
none of these provide an environment that is compatible with existing tools in the
control domain.
The MATLAB Genetic Algorithm Toolbox aims to make GAs accessible to the
control engineer within the framework of an existing CACSD package. This allows
the retention of existing modelling and simulation tools for building objective
functions and allows the user to make direct comparisons between genetic methods
and traditional procedures.
2.1 Tool box structure
The toolbox structure is built using MATLAB programming to implement the large
variety of genetic algorithm methods. There are several general steps that consist
of GAs operators such as initial population, evaluation, selection, crossover and
mutation for the series of genetic algorithm.
Initialization
Initialization or initial population is a set of individuals or possible solution that is
usually formed in random. It is the first thing to do to decide the coding structure.
This is the process of setting up the initial value for genetics parameters. In this
paper, the problem has been coded in permutation representation which is
appropriate for this kind of problem.

Evaluation or objective function

The evaluation or objective function is the most important step in genetic
algorithm where it is the step to evaluate the fitness function. It is used to decide
and value how individuals or chromosomes performed in the problem domain.
Evaluation offers a measure of performance regarding a particular set of
parameters. Each sequence generates the results where the result is used by GA for
selection operation.
Selection
The selection operator determines which of the individuals stay alive and carry on
for the next generation. The typical method used is Roulette Wheel Selection
(RWS) which was described by Goldberg (1989). The best performance individual
is selected more than once. Each member of the population is characterized by a
slice that is directly proportional to its fitness.
The selection operator implemented here is Stochastic Universal Sampling (SUS).
SUS is another method frequently used in selection operation and it is opposite to
the RWS. It is a method that gives the same portion of the selection and is
equivalent to making only one spin of a wheel.
Crossover
Crossover is the mating process by the parents to produce a new set of
chromosomes or children. Crossover involves crossing the genes from one
chromosome to another chromosome. The function of chromosome is to generate
new child or offspring from two parents of chromosomes by combining the
information and characteristics extracted from both parents.
Ordinal representation
The purpose of ordinal representation is to make sure the conventional crossover
operates for permutation representation. In the ordinal representation, there is a
path order that act as reference sequence for each sequence in the ordinal
representation.
Mutation
Mutation is another GAs operator that modifies one or more genes of a selected
chromosome from its initial condition where it only uses one parent to produce a
single new offspring by applying some kind of randomized change to the
representation. With new offspring and new gene values, the GA might be able to
get a better solution than previous one. The mutation operation must be done after

the ordinal representation switched back to the permutation representation to

ensure it creates a legal representation.
Applications and Further Developments
The GA Toolbox has been beta-tested at approximately 30 sites world-wide in a
wide range of application areas including:
parametric optimization
multiobjective optimization
controller structure selection
nonlinear system identification
mixed-mode modeling
neural network design
real-time and adaptive control
parallel genetic algorithms
fault identification
antenna design
In future releases we plan to incorporate support for multiobjective optimization.