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An Evolutionary Approach for Solving the Rubik’s Cube Incorporating Exact Methods

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Applications of Evolutionary Computation (EvoApplications 2010)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 6024))

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Abstract

Solutions calculated by Evolutionary Algorithms have come to surpass exact methods for solving various problems. The Rubik’s Cube multiobjective optimization problem is one such area. In this work we present an evolutionary approach to solve the Rubik’s Cube with a low number of moves by building upon the classic Thistlethwaite’s approach. We provide a group theoretic analysis of the subproblem complexity induced by Thistlethwaite’s group transitions and design an Evolutionary Algorithm from the ground up including detailed derivation of our custom fitness functions. The implementation resulting from these observations is thoroughly tested for integrity and random scrambles, revealing performance that is competitive with exact methods without the need for pre-calculated lookup-tables.

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© 2010 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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El-Sourani, N., Hauke, S., Borschbach, M. (2010). An Evolutionary Approach for Solving the Rubik’s Cube Incorporating Exact Methods. In: Di Chio, C., et al. Applications of Evolutionary Computation. EvoApplications 2010. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 6024. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-12239-2_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-12239-2_9

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-12238-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-12239-2

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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