The present paper aims to investigate the effects of modularity and the layout of subsystems and parts of a complex system on its maintainability. For this purpose, four objective functions have been considered simultaneously: I) maximizing the level of accordance between system design and optimum modularity design,II) maximizing the level of accessibility and the maintenance space required,III...

a new powerful optimization algorithm inspired from colonizing weeds is utilized to solve the well-known quadratic assignment problem (qap) which is of application in a large number of practical areas such as plant layout, machinery layout and so on. a set of reference numerical problems from qaplib is taken in order to evaluate the efficiency of the algorithm compared with the previous ones wh...

Modern digital signal processors DSPs provide dedicated address generation units AGUs which support data memory access by indirect addressing with automatic address modi cation in parallel to other machine operations There is no address computation overhead if the next address is within the auto modify range Typically optimization of data memory layout and address register assignment allows to ...

the integration of an approximate model and a clonal selection algorithm (csa) is considered to one of the most effective ways to solve complex optimization design problems in engineering. in this study, first, a process for developing an approximate model and the principles of clonal selection algorithms were presented. then, a variotherm temperature injection mold used to produce a large liqu...

the paper studies optimization of shell-and-tube heat exchangers using the particle swarm optimization technique. a total cost function is formulated based on initial and annual operating costs of the heat exchangers. six variables – shell inside diameter, tube diameter, baffle spacing, baffle cut, number of tube passes and tube layouts (triangular or square) – are considered as the design para...

It has been widely demonstrated by many research works that the distribution of a factory can condition its productivity. Because this, in Santiago, Chile, asked authors for advice to evaluate current situation company and what alternatives could be proposed improve performance increasing productivity without incurring too high costs. Among most important requirements requested was study design...