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Solving the coalition structure generation problem on a GPU

Solving the coalition structure generation problem on a GPU
Solving the coalition structure generation problem on a GPU
We develop the first parallel algorithm for Coalition Structure Generation (CSG), which is central to many multi-agent systems applications. Our approach involves distributing the key steps of a dynamic programming approach to CSG across computational nodes on a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) such that each of the thousands of threads of computation can be used to perform small computations that speed up the overall process. In so doing, we solve important challenges that arise in solving combinatorial optimisation problems on GPUs such as the efficient allocation of memory and computational threads to every step of the algorithm. In our empirical evaluations on a standard GPU, our results show an improvement of orders of magnitude over current dynamic programming approaches with an ever increasing divergence between the CPU and GPU-based algorithms in terms of growth. Thus, our algorithm is able to solve the CSG problem for 29 agents in one hour and thirty minutes as opposed to three days for the current state of the art dynamic programming algorithms.
Svensson, Kim
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Ramchurn, Sarvapali
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Cruz, Francisco
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Rodriguez-Aguilar, Juan-Antonio
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Cerquides, Jesus
d6f356ee-5d4a-41cf-b0fc-eed8c8ebfbea
Svensson, Kim
e6416207-815b-4363-8ba5-f018fdb7653e
Ramchurn, Sarvapali
1d62ae2a-a498-444e-912d-a6082d3aaea3
Cruz, Francisco
948156f5-119d-4ed1-be82-71eb5829fed8
Rodriguez-Aguilar, Juan-Antonio
fad66385-e142-412e-b912-9810e695eedb
Cerquides, Jesus
d6f356ee-5d4a-41cf-b0fc-eed8c8ebfbea

Svensson, Kim, Ramchurn, Sarvapali, Cruz, Francisco, Rodriguez-Aguilar, Juan-Antonio and Cerquides, Jesus (2013) Solving the coalition structure generation problem on a GPU. 6th International Workshop on Optimisation in Multi-Agent Systems, Minnesota, United States. 06 - 07 May 2013.

Record type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)

Abstract

We develop the first parallel algorithm for Coalition Structure Generation (CSG), which is central to many multi-agent systems applications. Our approach involves distributing the key steps of a dynamic programming approach to CSG across computational nodes on a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) such that each of the thousands of threads of computation can be used to perform small computations that speed up the overall process. In so doing, we solve important challenges that arise in solving combinatorial optimisation problems on GPUs such as the efficient allocation of memory and computational threads to every step of the algorithm. In our empirical evaluations on a standard GPU, our results show an improvement of orders of magnitude over current dynamic programming approaches with an ever increasing divergence between the CPU and GPU-based algorithms in terms of growth. Thus, our algorithm is able to solve the CSG problem for 29 agents in one hour and thirty minutes as opposed to three days for the current state of the art dynamic programming algorithms.

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More information

Published date: 7 May 2013
Venue - Dates: 6th International Workshop on Optimisation in Multi-Agent Systems, Minnesota, United States, 2013-05-06 - 2013-05-07
Organisations: Agents, Interactions & Complexity

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 352204
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/352204
PURE UUID: 648d86fc-7db2-4cac-bbcd-28530084c24c
ORCID for Sarvapali Ramchurn: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0001-9686-4302

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 14 May 2013 10:44
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 03:22

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Contributors

Author: Kim Svensson
Author: Sarvapali Ramchurn ORCID iD
Author: Francisco Cruz
Author: Juan-Antonio Rodriguez-Aguilar
Author: Jesus Cerquides

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