Application of Evolutionary Algorithms in Guaranteed Parameter Estimation

Model-based optimization and control is becoming more and more important in the process industries and in general. Modelling almost always involves the estimation of parameters from available data. The parameter estimation problem is usually posed as the minimization of the prediction error or the maximization of the likelihood function. If the uncertainty of the measurements taken from a real process is assumed to be an interval around the measured values, a set of parameter vectors exists that is able to describe the behavior of the systems within these uncertainties. Guaranteed parameter estimation deals with the problem of determining all parameter vectors that are compatible with uncertain observations. The solution of guaranteed parameter estimation problems for nonlinear dynamic models is computationally very demanding. In this contribution we present a memetic algorithm that determines the sets of feasible model parameters efficiently. It is applied to the estimation of kinetic parameters of a model that describes a copolymerization reaction. In the memetic algorithm, the fitness evaluation is based on the distance of the feasible solutions to each other, thus the presented approach is not restricted to a specific type of models.