Abstract

Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), in its present form, has been in existence for roughly a decade, with formative research in related domains (such as social modelling, computer graphics, simulation and animation of natural swarms or flocks) for some years before that; a relatively short time compared with some of the other natural computing paradigms such as artificial neural networks and evolutionary computation. However, in that short period, PSO has gained widespread appeal amongst researchers and has been shown to offer good performance in a variety of application domains, with potential for hybridisation and specialisation, and demonstration of some interesting emergent behaviour. This paper aims to offer a compendious and timely review of the field and the challenges and opportunities offered by this welcome addition to the optimization toolbox. Part I discusses the location of PSO within the broader domain of natural computing, considers the development of the algorithm, and refinements introduced to prevent swarm stagnation and tackle dynamic environments. Part II considers current research in hybridisation, combinatorial problems, multicriteria and constrained optimization, and a range of indicative application areas.