564 research outputs found
Algorithms for the continuous nonlinear resource allocation problem---new implementations and numerical studies
Patriksson (2008) provided a then up-to-date survey on the
continuous,separable, differentiable and convex resource allocation problem
with a single resource constraint. Since the publication of that paper the
interest in the problem has grown: several new applications have arisen where
the problem at hand constitutes a subproblem, and several new algorithms have
been developed for its efficient solution. This paper therefore serves three
purposes. First, it provides an up-to-date extension of the survey of the
literature of the field, complementing the survey in Patriksson (2008) with
more then 20 books and articles. Second, it contributes improvements of some of
these algorithms, in particular with an improvement of the pegging (that is,
variable fixing) process in the relaxation algorithm, and an improved means to
evaluate subsolutions. Third, it numerically evaluates several relaxation
(primal) and breakpoint (dual) algorithms, incorporating a variety of pegging
strategies, as well as a quasi-Newton method. Our conclusion is that our
modification of the relaxation algorithm performs the best. At least for
problem sizes up to 30 million variables the practical time complexity for the
breakpoint and relaxation algorithms is linear
Stationary probability density of stochastic search processes in global optimization
A method for the construction of approximate analytical expressions for the
stationary marginal densities of general stochastic search processes is
proposed. By the marginal densities, regions of the search space that with high
probability contain the global optima can be readily defined. The density
estimation procedure involves a controlled number of linear operations, with a
computational cost per iteration that grows linearly with problem size
Constructive solution methodologies to the capacitated newsvendor problem and surrogate extension
The newsvendor problem is a single-period stochastic model used to determine the order quantity of perishable product that maximizes/minimizes the profit/cost of the vendor under uncertain demand. The goal is to fmd an initial order quantity that can offset the impact of backlog or shortage caused by mismatch between the procurement amount and uncertain demand. If there are multiple products and substitution between them is feasible, overstocking and understocking can be further reduced and hence, the vendor\u27s overall profit is improved compared to the standard problem. When there are one or more resource constraints, such as budget, volume or weight, it becomes a constrained newsvendor problem.
In the past few decades, many researchers have proposed solution methods to solve the newsvendor problem. The literature is first reviewed where the performance of each of existing model is examined and its contribution is reported. To add to these works, it is complemented through developing constructive solution methods and extending the existing published works by introducing the product substitution models which so far has not received sufficient attention despite its importance to supply chain management decisions. To illustrate this dissertation provides an easy-to-use approach that utilizes the known network flow problem or knapsack problem. Then, a polynomial in fashion algorithm is developed to solve it. Extensive numerical experiments are conducted to compare the performance of the proposed method and some existing ones. Results show that the proposed approach though approximates, yet, it simplifies the solution steps without sacrificing accuracy. Further, this dissertation addresses the important arena of product substitute models. These models deal with two perishable products, a primary product and a surrogate one. The primary product yields higher profit than the surrogate. If the demand of the primary exceeds the available quantity and there is excess amount of the surrogate, this excess quantity can be utilized to fulfill the shortage. The objective is to find the optimal lot sizes of both products, that minimize the total cost (alternatively, maximize the profit). Simulation is utilized to validate the developed model. Since the analytical solutions are difficult to obtain, Mathematical software is employed to find the optimal results. Numerical experiments are also conducted to analyze the behavior of the optimal results versus the governing parameters. The results show the contribution of surrogate approach to the overall performance of the policy.
From a practical perspective, this dissertation introduces the applications of the proposed models and methods in different industries such as inventory management, grocery retailing, fashion sector and hotel reservation
Packing While Traveling: Mixed Integer Programming for a Class of Nonlinear Knapsack Problems
Packing and vehicle routing problems play an important role in the area of
supply chain management. In this paper, we introduce a non-linear knapsack
problem that occurs when packing items along a fixed route and taking into
account travel time. We investigate constrained and unconstrained versions of
the problem and show that both are NP-hard. In order to solve the problems, we
provide a pre-processing scheme as well as exact and approximate mixed integer
programming (MIP) solutions. Our experimental results show the effectiveness of
the MIP solutions and in particular point out that the approximate MIP approach
often leads to near optimal results within far less computation time than the
exact approach
- …