In this paper, we propose an improved differential evolution DE to solve parameter optimisation problems. The new approach is called ICBBDE, which is an enhanced version of bare bones DE BBDE. The ICBBDE employs an adaptive strategy to dynamically adjust the crossover rate. Moreover, a Cauchy mutation is used to improve the exploration ability. Experiments are conducted on a set of benchmark functions and two real-world parameter optimisation problems. Simulation results demonstrate the efficiency and effectiveness of our approach.