Initial-population bias in the univariate estimation of distribution algorithm

This paper analyzes the effects of an initial-population bias on the performance of the univariate marginal distribution algorithm (UMDA). The analysis considers two test problems: (1) onemax and (2) noisy onemax. Theoretical models are provided and verified with experiments. Intuitively, biasing the initial population toward the global optimum should improve performance of UMDA, whereas biasing the initial population away from the global optimum should have the opposite effect. Both theoretical and experimental results confirm this intuition. Effects of mutation on performance of UMDA with initial-population bias are also investigated.