IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation
Special Issue on
Evolutionary Optimization in Presence of Uncertainties

Call for Papers

In many real-world optimization problems, a wide range of uncertainties have to be considered. Generally, uncertainties in evolutionary optimization can be categorized into three classes.


1. The fitness function is uncertain or noisy. Noise in fitness evaluations may result from many different sources such as sensory measurement errors or numerical instabilities in simulation. Uncertainties also arise when the fitness function has to be estimated, e.g., if approximate models are used or fitness inheritance is adopted in order to save costly fitness evaluations.
2. The design variables or the environmental parameters are subject to perturbations or deterministic changes. It is very common that a system to be optimized is expected to perform satisfactorily even when the design variables or the environmental parameters change within a certain range, or the system has to work on more than one pre-determined nominal point. This issue is often known as the search for robust optimal solutions.
3. The fitness function is time-varying. In other words, the optimum of the system is changing with time, requiring a repeated re-optimization or even continuous tracking of the optimum.


Handling uncertainties in evolutionary optimization has received an increasing interest in the evolutionary community. A variety of methods for addressing uncertainties have been reported from different application backgrounds. The objective of this special issue is to collect a set of high-quality papers to discuss the above issues within a uniform framework, to reflect the most recent advances in the field and to present sophisticated real-world applications.

Topics of interest may include but are not limited to:
• handling noisy fitness functions
• handling approximation errors in fitness evaluations
• searching for robust optimal solutions
• tracking moving optima
• sophisticated real-world applications
  
  
Manuscripts should be prepared following the format standards of the IEEE. All submissions will be peer reviewed subject to the standards of the IEEE Transactions on Evolutionary Computation. Manuscripts based on previously published conference papers must be extended substantially. Electronic submissions in postscript or PDF are strongly preferred. If the submission is sent by regular mail, authors are requested to send six (6) copies of their manuscript. Please send all submissions to one of the guest editors:

Dr. Yaochu Jin
Honda Research Institute Europe
Carl-Legien-Str 30
63073 Offenbach am Main
GERMANY
Phone: +49 69 890 11 735
Fax: +49 69 890 11 749
Email: yaochu.jin@honda-ri.de


Dr. Juergen Branke
Institute AIFB
University of Karlsruhe
76128 Karlsruhe
GERMANY
Phone: +49 721 608 6585
Fax : +49 721 693 717
Email: branke@aifb.uni-karlsruhe.de

A tentative schedule is as follows:
• Submission deadline: May 31, 2004
• Notification of acceptance: September 30, 2004
• Final manuscript: November 30, 2004