Bio-Inspired Algorithms for the Vehicle Routing Problem

Authors

Abstract

The vehicle routing problem (VRP) is one of the most famous combinatorial optimization problems. In simple terms, the goal is to determine a set of routes with overall minimum cost that can satisfy several geographical scattered demands. A ?eet of vehicles located in one or more depots is available to ful?ll the requests. A large number of variants exist, adding di?erent constraints to the original de?nition. Some examples are related to the number of depots, the ordering for visiting the customers or to time windows specifying a desirable period to arrive to a given location.
Biological inspired computation is a ?eld devoted to the development of computational tools modeled after principles that exist in natural systems. The adoption of such design principles enables the production of problem solving techniques with enhanced robustness and ?exibility, able to tackle complex optimization situations. Prominent examples of bio-inspired approaches include evolutionary algorithms, swarm intelligence, neural networks or arti?cial immune systems. The ?rst publications reporting the application of bio-inspired approaches to the VRP are from the early 1990’s. Since then, a large number of proposals have been proposed for di?erent variants of the problem. Results presented in recent publications show that bio-inspired approaches are now highly competitive with other state-of-the-art heuristics. Given these circumstances, it is our conviction that this is an excellent occasion for the publication of this book. The fundamental principles related to the application of bio-inspired techniques to the VRP are now well established. In addition, this ?eld of research is extremely active, as it can be con?rmed by an inspection of recent issues of the most important journals and conference proceedings from this area. The goal of the volume is to present a collection of state-of-the-art contributions describing recent developments concerning the application of bio-inspired algorithms to the VRP. Over the 9 chapters, di?erent algorithmic approaches are considered and a diverse set of problem variants are addressed. Some contributions focus on standard benchmarks widely adopted by the research community, while others address real-world situations.

Keywords

bio-inspired algorithms, vehicle routing

Subject

bio-inspired algorithms, vehicle routing

Edited Book

Bio-Inspired Algorithms for the Vehicle Routing Problem, 978-3-540-85151-6, Springer 2009