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An imperialist competitive algorithm to schedule of receiving and shipping trucks in cross-docking systems

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Abstract

Using cross-docking system is a new strategy to improve responding time to customers with transferring items directly from receiving trucks to shipping trucks without being held in storage at warehouse. This paper studies the scheduling of receiving and shipping trucks in cross-docking systems which have a temporary storage in front of shipping dock and items can be held temporarily in storage until the appropriate shipping truck comes. The objective is to find the best sequence of receiving and shipping trucks to minimize the total number of products that pass trough temporary storage because decreasing inventory or eliminating storage is the way to reduce costs. These kinds of problem are complex. Therefore, we develop an imperialistic competitive algorithm (ICA) approach to tackle complexity. The results of this algorithm are compared with the best known genetic algorithm (GA) results that are obtained in the same time. The results show that ICA outperformed GA.

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Correspondence to M. Zandieh.

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Forouharfard, S., Zandieh, M. An imperialist competitive algorithm to schedule of receiving and shipping trucks in cross-docking systems. Int J Adv Manuf Technol 51, 1179–1193 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00170-010-2676-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00170-010-2676-5

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