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Generating coalition structures with finite bound from the optimal guarantees

Generating coalition structures with finite bound from the optimal guarantees
Generating coalition structures with finite bound from the optimal guarantees
The coalition formation process, in which a number of independent, autonomous agents come together to act as a collective, is an important form of interaction in multi-agent systems. When effective, such coalitions can improve the performance of the individual agents and/or of the system as a whole. However, one of the main problems that hinders the widespread adoption of coalition formation technologies is the computational complexity of coalition structure generation. That is, once a group of agents has been identified, how can it be partitioned in order to maximize the social payoff? This problem has been shown to be NP-hard and even finding a sub-optimal solution requires searching an exponential number of solutions. Against this background, this paper reports on a novel anytime algorithm for coalition structure generation that produces solutions that are within a finite bound from the optimal. Our algorithm is benchmarked against Sandholm et al's algorithm [8] (the only other known algorithm for this task that can also establish a worst-case bound from the optimal) and is shown to be up to 10379 times faster (for systems containing 1000 agents) when small bounds from the optimal are desirable.
564-571
Dang, V. D.
5215eda3-55fe-4f4b-8eec-e97f54260db2
Jennings, N. R.
ab3d94cc-247c-4545-9d1e-65873d6cdb30
Dang, V. D.
5215eda3-55fe-4f4b-8eec-e97f54260db2
Jennings, N. R.
ab3d94cc-247c-4545-9d1e-65873d6cdb30

Dang, V. D. and Jennings, N. R. (2004) Generating coalition structures with finite bound from the optimal guarantees. 3rd International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, New York, United States. pp. 564-571 .

Record type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)

Abstract

The coalition formation process, in which a number of independent, autonomous agents come together to act as a collective, is an important form of interaction in multi-agent systems. When effective, such coalitions can improve the performance of the individual agents and/or of the system as a whole. However, one of the main problems that hinders the widespread adoption of coalition formation technologies is the computational complexity of coalition structure generation. That is, once a group of agents has been identified, how can it be partitioned in order to maximize the social payoff? This problem has been shown to be NP-hard and even finding a sub-optimal solution requires searching an exponential number of solutions. Against this background, this paper reports on a novel anytime algorithm for coalition structure generation that produces solutions that are within a finite bound from the optimal. Our algorithm is benchmarked against Sandholm et al's algorithm [8] (the only other known algorithm for this task that can also establish a worst-case bound from the optimal) and is shown to be up to 10379 times faster (for systems containing 1000 agents) when small bounds from the optimal are desirable.

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Published date: 2004
Additional Information: Event Dates: 2004
Venue - Dates: 3rd International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, New York, United States, 2004-01-01
Organisations: Agents, Interactions & Complexity

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 259550
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/259550
PURE UUID: f7ccb080-5f87-4855-a593-3dade54eb989

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Date deposited: 29 Jul 2004
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 06:26

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Contributors

Author: V. D. Dang
Author: N. R. Jennings

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