Efficient combinedimmune-decompositionalgorithmforoptimalbufferallocationin production linesforthroughputandprofitmaximization

Adequate allocationofbuffersintransferlinesiscrucialtotheoptimizationoflinethroughputandwork in process(WIP)inventory.Theiroptimalallocationissubjecttospecificconstraints,associatedcosts, and revenueprojections.Inthispaper,weimplementacombinedartificialimmunesystemoptimization algorithm inconjunctionwithadecompositionmethodtooptimallyallocatebuffersintransferlines.The aim ofthebufferallocationproblem(BAP)istoachieveoptimalsystemperformanceunderbuffersspace constraints. Maximizinglinethroughputdoesnotnecessarilyachievemaximumprofit.Inthisstudythe immune decompositionalgorithm(IDA)isusedtodetermineoptimalbufferallocationformaximumline throughput andmaximumlineeconomicprofit. Results ofextensiveseriesoftestscarriedouttocompare,inproductionlineswithdifferentcharacteris- tics, theperformancesoftheproposedmethodandthoseofotheralgorithmsarepresented.