A long short-term memory-based hybrid model optimized using a genetic algorithm for particulate matter 2.5 prediction

Beijing, Shanghai, Singapore, and London are regions with high population density and industrial activities. In this sense, accurate prediction of the rate of particulate matter 2.5 (PM_2.5), one of the most important air pollutants, is very important for creating a healthy ecological system. This study proposes a hybrid method to predict PM_2.5 with high success. This method aims to optimize the Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) deep learning model, which successfully solves time series problems with a Genetic Algorithm (GA). Here, the hyperparameters of the LSTM model, such as the number of layers, number of neurons, number of epochs, and kernel size, are optimized to achieve the highest prediction rate. Against this backdrop, the present study uses for the first time a hybrid GA-LSTM model to predict PM_2.5 concentrations in Beijing, Shanghai, Singapore, and London. The Beijing dataset consists of 13 attributes, the Shanghai dataset consists of 10 attributes, the London dataset consists of 5 attributes, and the Singapore dataset consists of 7 attributes. In this study, input variables such as PM_2.5, DEWP, TEMP, PRESS, WS, WD, PRE, Snowfall hours, Rain hours, and Season were used. To assess the effectiveness of this hybrid method, the developed GA-LSTM model was compared with k-Nearest Neighbors (kNN), Random Forest (RF), Support Vector Regression (SVR), Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN), LSTM, and Gated Recurrent Units (GRU). Experimental results showed that GA-LSTM outperformed the compared models. In addition, one of the best results was obtained compared to other models in the literature.