Artificial Locust Swarm Routing Algorithm: : An Approach to Consider both Routing via FRA and Applying RAD

A problem of routing in airspace looks both similar and different to the problem of routing on the ground. There are many peculiarities in air routing. However, due to the complexity of the problem and its similarity to 2D routing, there are many applications of a good known routing techniques from graph theory, like Dijkstra, A-Star etc. Nevertheless, these algorithms remain nearly useless or reveal poor efficiency at least in case of implementing specificity of a free routing airspace (FRA) and/or applying some kind of restrictions derived from route availability document (RAD). The results of research presented in current paper give the approach to solve routing problem in airspace with an ability to involve both understanding of routing via FRA and necessity of applying some known restrictions from RAD. The key idea of the developed algorithm is to combine routing in both regular and free airspaces and to apply some permanent requirements from route availability documents within a single route construction procedure. The solution was found in area of so named nature-inspired algorithms. The routing algorithm was considered similar to behavior of a locust swarm according to a few basic principles of movement. Applying some abstraction of a single locust behavior within a swarm allows considering the artificial locust swarm to be a good approach in search of route between departure and destination points for the routing problem in airspace. A couple of algorithm modifications and its areas of applicability were discussed also. Artificial locust swarm routing (ALSR) algorithm can be used as a platform solution for routes construction in airspace and is expected to allow further implementation of some particular routes optimization techniques, like genetic algorithms (GA) and/or other.