OPTIMIZATION OF RULE-BASED SYSTEMS As we have seen in chapters 10 and 11, embedded rule-based expert systems must satisfy stringent timing constraints when applied to real-time environments. We now describe a novel approach to reduce the response time of rule-based expert systems. This optimization is needed when a rule-based system does not meet the specified response-time constraints. Our optimization method is based on a construction of the reduced cycle-free finite-state space-graph.