Abstract
Backlogged empty containers have gradually turned into a serious burden to shipping networks. Empty container allocation has become an urgent settlement issue for the container shipping industry on a global scale. Therefore, this paper proposes an improved immune algorithm based recursive model for optimizing static empty container allocation which integrates with the global maritime container shipping network. This model minimizes the operating and capital costs during container shipping considering 0–1 mixed-integer programming. So an immune algorithm procedure based on a special twodimensional chromosome encoding is proposed. Finally, computational experiments are performed to optimize a 10-port static empty container shipping system. The results indicate that the proposed recursive model for static empty container allocation is effective in making an optimal strategy for empty container allocation.
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Zijian Guo received his PhD from Nihon University, Japan, in 1995. From 1999 to 2001, he was a Post-Doctoral Fellow of the Department of Civil Engineering, University of Tokyo, Japan. In 2002, he worked as a Post-Doctoral Fellow in the UPS Center for Worldwide Supply Chain Management, University of Louisville, USA. Currently, he is a Professor and doctoral advisor in the Faculty of Infrastructure Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, China. His research interests cover optimization of integrated transport systems, and port system and logistics. He is also editor-in-chief of Port Planning and Layout (third edition).
Wenyuan Wang obtained her bachelor degree in port, waterway, and coastal engineering in 2006, and her master degree in harbor, coastal and offshore engineering in 2009, both from Dalian University of Technology. Currently, she is a PhD student in the Faculty of Infrastructure Engineering in the same university. She maintains active research interests in the optimization of container transportation networks, simulation and optimization of port system.
Guolei Tang received his PhD from Dalian University of Technology in 2009. From 2009 till now, he has worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow and then a lecturer in Faculty of Infrastructure Engineering, Dalian University of Technology. He has completed series of academic research and consultancy projects in the areas of simulation and optimization of port systems, port logistics, and network optimization.
Jun Huang received his bachelor degree in Port, Waterway, and Coastal Engineering from Dalian University of Technology in 2005, and master degree in Harbor, Coastal and Offshore Engineering in 2008 both from Dalian University of Technology. Now, he is an engineer in transport planning and research institute ministry of communications. His research interest is port Planning.
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Guo, Z., Wang, W., Tang, G. et al. A recursive model for static empty container allocation. Front. Comput. Sci. China 5, 486–495 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11704-011-1013-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11704-011-1013-y