October 21 - 26, 2019 , Prof. Erik D. Goodman , Director of BEACON Center and Professor of Michigan State University , was invited to Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Digital Signal and Image Processing for academic visits, and conducted in-depth discussions and academic exchanges with Prof. Fan Zhun, director of the key laboratory and student members of the key laboratory.

A report by Professor Erik D. Goodman

      During the academic visits, Prof. Erik D. Goodman presented four presentations, which includes: ‘Beyond Trivial Parallelism in Evolutionary Computation’, ‘Metameric Representations Improve Search in Evolutionary Optimization’, ‘Evolutionary Computation: A Path from Biology to Artificial Intelligence’, and ‘Beyond Trivial Parallelism Part II—Solid Fuel Rocket Example’. The intriguing reports of Professor Erik D. Goodman attracted the attention and discussion of teachers and students from different majors

Introduce related work to Erik D. Goodman

The teachers and students are listening to the report

Group photo

      It is worth mentioning that there is a very close relationship between the BEACON center and Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Digital Signal and Image Processing, they have jointly established the International Research Center of Evolutionary Intelligence and Robotics. In 2019, researchers from this International Research Center have published five SCI journal in the field of artificial intelligence and evolutionary computing. Moreover, Prof. Erik D. Goodman has been repeatedly invited and visited the Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Digital Signal and Image Processing.

      Recently, the Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Digital Signal and Image Processing has been approved two major scientific research projects, namely the Base Project of International Science and Technology Cooperation of Guangdong Province, and the International Industrial Innovation Alliance Agreement. Among the Base Project of International Science and Technology Cooperation of Guangdong Province, the BEACON center and the key laboratory jointly declared a major research project, namely the robot design automation platform integrated with multi-objective evolutionary computation and deep neural network. This project aims at developing a robotic design automation platform that integrates multi-objective evolutionary computation, deep neural network and genetic programming, automatic design of robot controller, computer vision system and robot structural entity.

       Another important research project is the International Industrial Innovation Alliance Agreement named ‘Artificial Intelligence and Digital Manufacturing International Industrial Technology Innovation Alliance’, which consist of Shantou University, South China University of Technology, Hstar Technologies Corp, Shantou University, City University of Hong Kong, Michigan state university (BEACON center), Shenzhen Academy of Robotics and other research institution. Among which, Shantou University is responsible for the research and development of design automation technology. The BEACON Center is responsible for the research and application of evolutionary algorithms.

      In future, the BEACON Center and the Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Digital Signal and Image Processing will continue to conduct more in-depth collaborative exploration and research in related fields such as evolutionary computing, neural architecture search and design automation.