English

A mechanical model for the transportation problem

Optimization and Control 2007-05-23 v1 Astrophysics Discrete Mathematics Numerical Analysis Numerical Analysis

Abstract

We describe a mechanical device which can be used as an analog computer to solve the transportation problem. In practice this device is simulated by a numerical algorithm. Tests show that this algorithm is 60 times faster than a current subroutine (NAG library) for an average 1000 x 1000 problem. Its performance is even better for degenerate problems in which the weights take only a small number of integer values.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.math/0209047,
  title  = {A mechanical model for the transportation problem},
  author = {Michel Henon},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:math/0209047},
  year   = {2007}
}

Comments

45 pages, 10 figures, 4 tables. This paper was written in 1992, but not published (see Addendum for a brief history)