Overview

Nature inspired optimisation methods are attractive for tackling complex optimisation problems in chemical engineering, problems that may be nonlinear, non-convex, combinatorial, and discontinuous. These methods are often simple to understand and to implement. The Julia language is a recent addition to the panoply of programming languages we have available for scientific and engineering computing. It has many advanced features and makes implementing nature inspired methods easy.

This talk will illustrate a selection of nature inspired optimisation methods, together with their implementation in Julia, through the application to a number of optimisation problems in chemical engineering. It is intended for those interested in optimisation and may be wanting to implement their own methods or use the ones presented. All the software that forms the basis of the talk is available freely.

Speaker

Eric Fraga, Director of Postgraduate Studies, UCL Dept of Chemical Engineering, University College London

Eric is professor of process systems engineering in the Department of Chemical Engineering at University College London (UCL) and a member of the Sargent Centre for Process Systems Engineering (CPSE). He joined UCL in 1996 as an EPSRC advanced research fellow. Prior to this, he was a senior research fellow in the Departments of Chemical Engineering and Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Edinburgh from 1989 to 1996. He was awarded his PhD in Computer Science from the University of Waterloo (Canada) in 1988. In 2012-2013, he held the Santos Chair of Energy and Resources at UCL Australia where he was also the academic director.

Professor Fraga's research lies at the interfaces between industrial engineering, mathematics and computer science. His research broadly falls into two categories: the development of new computational methodologies for computational systems engineering and the design and implementation of computer interfaces for aiding engineers in the use of advanced computational tools in design. In the course of his research, he has developed the Jacaranda system for automated design and process optimisation and the Strawberry and Fresa nature-inspired evolutionary optimisation methods.

The material presented at this event has not been peer-reviewed. Any opinions are the presenter's own and do not necessarily represent those of IChemE or the Computer Aided Process Engineering SIG. The information is given in good faith but without any liability on the part of IChemE.

Webinar archive

This webinar is free of charge and open to all to attend, but if you wish to access the slides and a recording to replay on demand then you'll need to be a member of the CAPE Special Interest Group.