Nearest-Better Network for Fitness Landscape Analysis of Continuous Optimization Problems

Fitness landscape analysis (FLA) is quite important in evolutionary computation. In this paper, we propose a novel FLA method, the nearest-better network (NBN), which uses the nearest-better relationship to simplify the original fitness landscape of continuous optimization problems. We introduce an efficient algorithm to calculate NBN for continuous problems. We also propose four numerical measurements and a 3D visualization method based on NBN. Experiments show that compared to the other main FLA methods, the four numerical measurements proposed here can effectively measure the four intended features: neutrality, ruggedness, modality, and basin of attraction, respectively, and common features of the fitness landscape can be maintained in 3D NBN visualization, regardless of the scale of the problem. NBN also provides a view of how algorithms search in high-dimensional problems with the help of the 3D NBN visualization.