An optimal design of neuro-FLC by Lamarckian co-adaptation of learning and evolution

Abstract

This paper proposes a new design method of neuro-FLC by the Lamarckian co-adaptation scheme that incorporates the backpropagation learning into the GA evolution in an attempt to find optimal design parameters (fuzzy rule base and membership functions) of application-specific FLC. The design parameters are determined by evolution and learning in a way that the evolution performs the global search and makes inter-FLC parameter adjustments in order to obtain both the optimal rule base having high covering value and small number of useful fuzzy rules and the optimal membership functions having small approximation error and good control performance while the learning performs the local search and makes intra-FLC parameter adjustments by interacting each FLC with its environment. The proposed co-adaptive design method produces better approximation ability because it includes the backpropagation learning in every generation of GA evolution, shows better control performance because the used COG defuzzifier does compute the crisp value accurately, and requires small workspace because the optimization procedure of fuzzy rule base and membership functions is performed concurrently by an integrated fitness function on the same fuzzy partition. Simulation results show that the Lamarckian co-adapted FLC produces the most superior one among the differently generated FLCs in all aspects such as the number of fuzzy rules, the approximation error, and the average tracing distance. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.