An Electromagnetism-like Mechanism for Global Optimization

This paper proposes a new heuristic for global optimization. The method utilizes an attraction-repulsion mechanism to move the sample points towards the optimality. The proposed scheme can be used either as a stand-alone approach or as an accompanying procedure for other methods. Some test results on nonlinear test functions in the category of ``minor to moderate difficulty' are included. The ease of implementation and flexibility of the heuristic show the potential of this new approach.