Operations Research, Systems Engineering and Industrial Engineering Commons^™

The Development And Use Of The Probabilistic Financial Decision Model For A Company Expansion, Elizabeth Wiese

Senior Honors Theses

In the United States, companies are expanding constantly. However, in an industrial equipment dealership expanding into a new state, it is important to understand the industry, new market, and costs associated with expanding. With using financial statements of data-backed percentages for growth, research seeks to set up a financial model to see if expansion for an industrial equipment dealership into the state of North Carolina will be a financially wise decision. Wesley Worldwide, an industrial equipment dealership, is moving forward with the investment of expanding into North Carolina. However, it is vital to understand the financial predictions for profit return …

The Traveling Salesman Problem: An Analysis And Comparison Of Metaheuristics And Algorithms, Mason Helmick

Senior Honors Theses

One of the most investigated topics in operations research is the Traveling Salesman Problem (TSP) and the algorithms that can be used to solve it. Despite its relatively simple formulation, its computational difficulty keeps it and potential solution methods at the forefront of current research. This paper defines and analyzes numerous proposed solutions to the TSP in order to facilitate understanding of the problem. Additionally, the efficiencies of different heuristics are studied and compared to the aforementioned algorithms’ accuracy, as a quick algorithm is often formulated at the expense of an exact solution.

Cost Functions Of Crabs: Applications Of Hermit Crab Shell Exchange Behavior To Vacancy Chain Modelling, Hannah Miele

Senior Honors Theses

Vacancy chain systems function as a method of resource distribution in domains such as housing and labor markets. Hermit crabs also employ vacancy chains as a method of shell exchange. Application of vacancy chain modelling in engineering has been attempted, but numerous flaws exist in the developed vacancy chain scheduling algorithm. This work addresses the lack of an appropriate vacancy chain cost function by developing a generalizable cost function based on hermit crab shell exchange behavior. The cost function’s purpose is enabling development of realistic engineering experiments and models based on real-world vacancy chain systems.

An Aco-Inspired, Probabilistic, Greedy Approach To The Drone Traveling Salesman Problem, Jessica Houseknecht

Senior Honors Theses

In recent years, major companies have done research on using drones for parcel delivery. Research has shown that this can result in significant savings, which has led to the formulation of various truck and drone routing and scheduling optimization problems. This paper explains and analyzes a new approach to the Drone Traveling Salesman Problem (DTSP) based on ant colony optimization (ACO).

The ACO-based approach has an acceptance policy that maximizes the usage of the drone. The results reveal that the pheromone causes the algorithm to converge quickly to the best solution. The algorithm performs comparably to the MIP model, CP …