Multiple Evolutionary Agents For Decision Support (original) (raw)

Supporting evolution in a multi-agent cooperative design environment

Advances in Engineering Software, 2002

New architectures for next-generation of computer-aided design environments need to be distributed, evolutive, and cooperative. This paper presents a multi-agent design environment that supports cooperative and evolutionary design by cooperation of a group of agents. Multi-agent system architecture offers a promising framework with its novel approach for dynamically creating and managing agent communities in widely distributed and ever-changing design environments; while the genetic algorithm based approach provides a foundation for supporting evolutionary and innovative design abilities. The computational and information processing processes involved in evolutionary and distributed environment are discussed in this paper. q

DIDE: a multi-agent environment for engineering design

1995

Real world engineering design projects require the cooperation of multidisciplinary design teams using sophisticated and powerful engineering tools. The individuals or the individual groups of the multidisciplinary design teams work in parallel and independently with the different engineering tools which are located on the different sites for often a long time. In order to ensure the coordination of the design activities of the different groups or the cooperation among the different engineering tools, it is necessary to develop an efficient distributed intelligent design environment. This paper discusses a distributed axchitecturc for integrating such engineering tools in an open design environment organized as a population of asynchronous cognitive agents. Before introducing the general architecture and the communicat.ion protocol, issues about the agent axchitecture azLd the inter-agent communication axe discussed. A prototype of such an environment with seven independent agents located in the different workstations and microcomputers is presented and an example of a sin',all mechanical design is used for demonstrating such an environment.

An agent-based approach to engineering design

Computers in Industry, 2002

Among the features of concurrent engineering is the notion of distributed design, and the ability to communicate design changes to multidisciplinary teams. Engineering design is a complex activity. Differences in system architectures and information structures, and co-ordination requirements tend to reduce the effectiveness of distributed design. Current thinking indicates that multi-agent systems (MAS) can alleviate some of the complex engineering design problems. In this paper, it is argued that agent attributes such as proactiveness and autonomy can overcome these limitations. Agents provide a¯exible and dynamic approach to distributed/multidisciplinary design team which can reduce redundant design activities, and improve coordination. #

AN EXPERIMENTAL MULTI-AGENT ENVIRONMENT FOR ENGINEERING DESIGN

International Journal of Cooperative Information Systems, 1996

Real world engineering design projects require the cooperation of multidisciplinary design teams using sophisticated and powerful engineering tools. The individuals or the individual groups of the multidisciplinary design teams work in parallel and independently often for quite a long time with di erent tools located on various sites. In order to ensure the coordination of design activities in the different groups or the cooperation among the di erent tools, it is necessary to develop an e cient design environment. This paper discusses a distributed architecture for integrating such engineering tools in an open design environment, organized as a population of asynchronous cognitive agents. Before introducing the general architecture and the communication protocol, issues about an agent architecture and inter-agent communications are discussed. A prototype of such an environment with a number of independent agents located in several workstations is then presented and demonstrated on an example of a small mechanical design.

Conflicts and negotiation in single function agent based design systems

Concurrent Engineering, 1996

A basic ingredient of Concurrent Engineering (CE) is that all aspects of the product's life-cycle should be considered as early as possible during design. A key idea that has been adopted for the implementation of CE is the use of a team, in which each member is an expert on some aspect of the product in a phase of its life-cycle. In our work, we use a team of software agents. Our goal is to study in detail the interactions, con icts and con ict resolution that is possible with such a multi-agent system. The approach is to use Single Function Agents (SiFAs), each of which can perform a very specialized task, from a single point of view. The ability to represent expertise with di erent points of view is very important in design. These di erent points of view usually cause con icts among agents, and these con icts need to be resolved in order for the design process to be successful. Therefore, agents need to be capable of detecting and resolving these con icts. This paper presents a model of con icts and negotiations in the SiFA framework. A hierarchy of possible con icts is proposed and the steps of the negotiation process are discussed.

Design Agency: Prototyping Multi-Agent System Simulation for Design Search and Exploration

SimAUD 2014 Proceedings

This work presents prototypes of multi-agent system simulation for design search and exploration. We describe an experimental approach in part based on a previously established multidisciplinary design optimization (MDO) framework. Here the work further explores the potential impact of MDO in conjunction with multi-agent systems on the early stages of design. Specifically, this paper addresses the potential of introducing agent-based computing techniques into the multidisciplinary architectural design optimization and search workflow to tackle geometrically complex design problems and to facilitate early stage design exploration. To address these interests, a series of prototyped workflows were studied inclusive of environmental performance and structural performance metrics and benchmarks. This paper presents a novel methodology for using simulation data in conjunction with multi-agent systems as a way for reinforming form and enhancing performance in a generative design environment. The methodology is based on the use of swarm algorithms and their integration with data generated by simulation software. The interaction between these two domains, the simulation data and swarm algorithms, generates the final output as a modified geometry that is then evaluated by comparison for enhanced design performance.

Constructing design methodologies using multiagent systems

AI EDAM: Artificial Intelligence for …, 2004

An innovative approach has been developed for discovering better design methodologies that is based on simulating the design process using a multi-agent system that mimics the behavior of a design team. The system implements a knowledge-based model of design in which highly specialized knowledge from expert sources is applied to synthesize a design. The agents activate the pieces of design knowledge when they become applicable. The use of knowledge by agents is recorded by tracing the steps that the agents have taken during a design project. Many traces are generated by solving a large number of design projects that differ in their requirements. A set of design methodologies is constructed by using inductive learning techniques to generalize the traces generated. These methodologies then can be used to guide design teams through future design projects.

An Agent-Oriented Model of a Dynamic Engineering Design Process

2005

One way to make engineering design effective and efficient is to make its processes flexible i.e. self-adjusting, self-configuring, and self-optimizing at run time. This paper presents the descriptive part of the Dynamic Engineering Design Process (DEDP) modelling framework developed in the PSI project. The project aims to build a software tool to assist managers to analyse and enhance the productivity of the DEDPs through process simulations. The framework incorporates the models of teams and actors, tasks and activities as well as design artefacts as the major interrelated parts. DEDPs are modelled as weakly defined flows of tasks and atomic activities that may only “become apparent” at run time because of several presented dynamic factors. The processes are self-formed through the mechanisms of collaboration in the dynamic team of actors. These mechanisms are based on contracting negotiations. DEDP productivity is assessed by the Units of Welfare collected by the multi-agent system that models the design team. The models of the framework are formalized in the family of PSI ontologies.

An agent-supported approach for the collaborative design of complex systems

International Journal of Modeling, Simulation, and Scientific Computing, 2016

A novel approach for partitioning and coordinating the collaborative design optimization of complex systems is described. A partitioning metric has been formulated to select the best partitioning solutions among the total possibilities of dividing the complex design optimization problem. Then, an agent-supported approach is used for the coordination of the collaborative design optimization. The approach has been applied to the case of a preliminary design of an electric vehicle, to demonstrate how various agents can effectively communicate with each other to provide support to the collaborative design optimization of complex systems.