Modified harmony search and its application to cost minimization of RC columns

This paper presents a variant of the Harmony Search Algorithm (HS) and its application to discrete optimization. The main proposed modifications regarding original HS are related to stopping criterion and reinitialization of population, called Harmony Memory. In order to investigate the efficiency of the algorithm, it was applied for obtaining optimal sections of reinforced concrete columns subjected to uniaxial flexural compression. To minimize the cost of the section, the amount and diameters of the reinforcement bars and the dimensions of the columns cross sections were considered as design variables. The obtained results were compared to those generated by other optimization methods. Since, to the examples, Harmony Search reached the same results achieved by Simulated Annealing, some additional analysis are presented in order to compare these methods regarding success rate and number of iterations to reach the optimum.