Abstract. Groundwater is one of the most valuable natural resources in the world (Jha
et al., 2007). However, it is not an unlimited resource; therefore
understanding groundwater potential is crucial to ensure its sustainable use.
The aim of the current study is to propose and verify new artificial
intelligence methods for the spatial prediction of groundwater spring
potential mapping at the Koohdasht–Nourabad plain, Lorestan province, Iran.
These methods are new hybrids of an adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system
(ANFIS) and five metaheuristic algorithms, namely invasive weed optimization
(IWO), differential evolution (DE), firefly algorithm (FA), particle swarm
optimization (PSO), and the bees algorithm (BA). A total of 2463 spring
locations were identified and collected, and then divided randomly into two
subsets: 70 % (1725 locations) were used for training models and the
remaining 30 % (738 spring locations) were utilized for evaluating the
models. A total of 13 groundwater conditioning factors were prepared for
modeling, namely the slope degree, slope aspect, altitude, plan curvature,
stream power index (SPI), topographic wetness index (TWI), terrain roughness
index (TRI), distance from fault, distance from river, land use/land cover,
rainfall, soil order, and lithology. In the next step, the step-wise
assessment ratio analysis (SWARA) method was applied to quantify the degree
of relevance of these groundwater conditioning factors. The global
performance of these derived models was assessed using the area under the
curve (AUC). In addition, the Friedman and Wilcoxon signed-rank tests were
carried out to check and confirm the best model to use in this study. The
result showed that all models have a high prediction performance; however,
the ANFIS–DE model has the highest prediction capability (AUC = 0.875),
followed by the ANFIS–IWO model, the ANFIS–FA model (0.873), the ANFIS–PSO
model (0.865), and the ANFIS–BA model (0.839). The results of this research
can be useful for decision makers responsible for the sustainable management
of groundwater resources.