Book Description

The generalization of optimization theory and techniques to other formulations comprises a large area of applied mathematics. Optimization includes finding "best available" values of some objective function given a defined domain (or input), including a variety of different types of objective functions and different types of domains.Adding more than one objective to an optimization problem adds complexity. For example, to optimize a structural design, one would desire a design that is both light and rigid. When two objectives conflict, a trade-off must be created. There may be one lightest design, one stiffest design, and an infinite number of designs that are some compromise of weight and rigidity. The set of trade-off designs that cannot be improved upon according to one criterion without hurting another criterion is known as the Pareto set. The curve created plotting weight against stiffness of the best designs is known as the Pareto frontier.A design is judged to be "Pareto optimal" (equivalently, "Pareto efficient" or in the Pareto set) if it is not dominated by any other design: If it is worse than another design in some respects and no better in any respect, then it is dominated and is not Pareto optimal. The choice among "Pareto optimal" solutions to determine the "favorite solution" is delegated to the decision maker. In other words, defining the problem as multi-objective optimization signals that some information is missing: desirable objectives are given but combinations of them are not rated relative to each other. In some cases, the missing information can be derived by interactive sessions with the decision maker.Multi-objective optimization problems have been generalized further into vector optimization problems where the (partial) ordering is no longer given by the Pareto ordering.Optimization problems are often multi-modal; that is, they possess multiple good solutions. They could all be globally good or there could be a mix of globally good and locally good solutions. Obtaining all (or at least some of) the multiple solutions is the goal of a multi-modal optimizer.Classical optimization techniques due to their iterative approach do not perform satisfactorily when they are used to obtain multiple solutions, since it is not guaranteed that different solutions will be obtained even with different starting points in multiple runs of the algorithm. Evolutionary algorithms, however, are a very popular approach to obtain multiple solutions in a multi-modal optimization task.This book develops the following topics:* "Multiobjective Optimization Algorithms" * "Using fminimax with a Simulink Model" * "Signal Processing Using fgoalattain" * "Generate and Plot a Pareto Front" * "Linear Programming Algorithms" * "Maximize Long-Term Investments Using Linear Programming" * "Mixed-Integer Linear Programming Algorithms" * "Tuning Integer Linear Programming" * "Mixed-Integer Linear Programming Basics" * "Optimal Dispatch of Power Generators" * "Mixed-Integer Quadratic Programming Portfolio Optimization" * "Quadratic Programming Algorithms"* "Quadratic Minimization with Bound Constraints" * "Quadratic Minimization with Dense, Structured Hessian"* "Large Sparse Quadratic Program with Interior Point Algorithm" * "Least-Squares (Model Fitting) Algorithms" * "lsqnonlin with a Simulink Model" * "Nonlinear Least Squares With and Without Jacobian" * "Linear Least Squares with Bound Constraints" * "Optimization App with the lsqlin Solver" * "Maximize Long-Term Investments Using Linear Programming" * "Jacobian Multiply Function with Linear Least Squares" * "Nonlinear Curve Fitting with lsqcurvefit" * "Fit a Model to Complex-Valued Data" * "Systems of Equations" * "Nonlinear Equations with Analytic Jacobian" * "Nonlinear Equations with Jacobian" * "Nonlinear Equations with Jacobian Sparsity Pattern"* "Nonlinear Systems with Constraints" * "Parallel Computing for Optimization"