Lin–Kernighan heuristic

About: Lin–Kernighan heuristic is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 687 publications have been published within this topic receiving 35245 citations.

An Effective Heuristic Algorithm for the Traveling-Salesman Problem

Abstract: This paper discusses a highly effective heuristic procedure for generating optimum and near-optimum solutions for the symmetric traveling-salesman problem. The procedure is based on a general approach to heuristics that is believed to have wide applicability in combinatorial optimization problems. The procedure produces optimum solutions for all problems tested, "classical" problems appearing in the literature, as well as randomly generated test problems, up to 110 cities. Run times grow approximately as n2; in absolute terms, a typical 100-city problem requires less than 25 seconds for one case GE635, and about three minutes to obtain the optimum with above 95 per cent confidence.

TSPLIB—A Traveling Salesman Problem Library

Abstract: This paper contains the description of a traveling salesman problem library (TSPLIB) which is meant to provide researchers with a broad set of test problems from various sources and with various properties. For every problem a short description is given along with known lower and upper bounds. Several references to computational tests on some of the problems are given. INFORMS Journal on Computing, ISSN 1091-9856, was published as ORSA Journal on Computing from 1989 to 1995 under ISSN 0899-1499.

Computer solutions of the traveling salesman problem

Abstract: Two algorithms for solving the (symmetric distance) traveling salesman problem have been programmed for a high-speed digital computer. The first produces guaranteed optimal solution for problems involving no more than 13 cities; the time required (IBM 7094 II) varies from 60 milliseconds for a 9-city problem to 1.75 seconds for a 13-city problem. The second algorithm produces precisely characterized, locally optimal solutions for large problems (up to 145 cities) in an extremely short time and is based on a general heuristic approach believed to be of general applicability to various optimization problems. The average time required to obtain a locally optimal solution is under 30n3 microseconds where n is the number of cities involved. Repeated runs on a problem from random initial tours result in a high probability of finding the optimal solution among the locally optimal solutions obtained. For large problems where many locally optimal solutions have to be obtained in order to be reasonably assured of having the optimal solution, an efficient reduction scheme is incorporated in the program to reduce the total computation time by a substantial amount.

Ant colonies for the travelling salesman problem

Abstract: We describe an artificial ant colony capable of solving the travelling salesman problem (TSP). Ants of the artificial colony are able to generate successively shorter feasible tours by using information accumulated in the form of a pheromone trail deposited on the edges of the TSP graph. Computer simulations demonstrate that the artificial ant colony is capable of generating good solutions to both symmetric and asymmetric instances of the TSP. The method is an example, like simulated annealing, neural networks and evolutionary computation, of the successful use of a natural metaphor to design an optimization algorithm.