In this article, we present a new algorithm for the well-known and computationally challenging Sudoku puzzle game. Our ant-colony-optimization-based method significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art algorithm on the hardest, large instances of Sudoku. We provide evidence that—compared to traditional backtracking methods—our algorithm offers a much more efficient search of the solution space, and demonstrate the utility of a novel antistagnation operator. This work lays the foundation for future work on a general-purpose puzzle solver, and establishes Japanese pencil puzzles as a suitable platform for benchmarking a wide range of algorithms.

中文翻译：

---

用蚁群优化解决数独

在本文中，我们为著名且具有计算挑战性的数独益智游戏提出了一种新算法。我们基于蚁群优化的方法在最难的大型数独实例上明显优于最先进的算法。我们提供的证据表明，与传统的回溯方法相比，我们的算法提供了更有效的解空间搜索，并证明了新型反停滞算子的实用性。这项工作为未来通用拼图解算器的工作奠定了基础，并将日本铅笔拼图作为一个合适的平台来对各种算法进行基准测试。