Determining the number of operators who set up the machines in a human-machine system is crucial for maximizing the benefits of automated production machines. A man-machine chart is an effective tool for identifying bottlenecks, improving process efficiency, and determining the optimal number of machines per operator. However, traditional man-machine charts are lacking in accounting for idle times, such as interruptions caused by other material handling equipment. We present an adjusted man-machine chart that determines the number of machines per operator, incorporating idleness as a penalty term. The adjusted man-machine chart efficiently deploys and schedules operators for the hole machining process to enhance productivity, where operators have various idle times, such as break times and waiting times by forklifts or trailers. Further, we conduct a simulation validation of traditional and proposed charts under various operational environments of operators’ fixed and flexible break times. The simulation results indicate that the adjusted man-machine chart is better suited for real-world work environments and significantly improves productivity.

This paper proposes an algorithm for the Unrelated Parallel Machine Scheduling Problem(UPMSP) without setup times, aiming to minimize total tardiness. As an NP-hard problem, the UPMSP is hard to get an optimal solution. Consequently, practical scenarios are solved by relying on operator's experiences or simple heuristic approaches. The proposed algorithm has adapted two methods: a policy network method, based on Transformer to compute the correlation between individual jobs and machines, and another method to train the network with a reinforcement learning algorithm based on the REINFORCE with Baseline algorithm. The proposed algorithm was evaluated on randomly generated problems and the results were compared with those obtained using CPLEX, as well as three scheduling algorithms. This paper confirms that the proposed algorithm outperforms the comparison algorithms, as evidenced by the test results.

PURPOSES : Most Red bus1) (metropolitan bus) routes to Seoul need to increase supply by increasing the number of buses and number of trips because of the high level of congestion in buses, which also accommodate standing passengers. Due to the recent Itaewon disaster, people have been banned from standing on Red buses due to concerns over the excessive use of public transportation, adding to the inconvenience of passengers, such as increased travel time. However, some routes incur a large deficit owing to excess vehicles and trips relative to the number of passengers, thereby increasing the financial burden of Gyeonggi. Therefore, in this study, a reasonable operation plan is required based on the demand on Red bus routes. METHODS : Using accurate data from smart cards and a Bus Management System, the model was applied to consider bus usage, bus arrival distribution, waiting time, and operating conditions, such as actual bus usage time and bus dispatch interval. RESULTS : As a result of applying the model, buses between 7:00 and 9:00 and 16:00 and 18:00 were very crowded because of standing passengers, and passenger inconvenience costs decreased because of the longer waiting times for bus stops in Seoul. Currently, there are 15 buses in operation for the red bus G8110. However, considering the annual transportation cost, transportation income, and support fund limit, up to 12 buses can be operated per day. The G8110 route was analyzed at 23.6 million won for passenger discomfort cost, as 15 buses operated 97 times per day on weekdays. However, when establishing optimal scheduling, 12 buses per day operated 75 times per day, with a 19.7 million won passenger discomfort cost. CONCLUSIONS : As all red buses run from the starting point, passengers at the bus stop wait for more than an hour before entering Seoul, and the passenger discomfort cost of using demand-responsive chartered buses decreases only when commuting from Jeongja Station and Namdaemun Tax Office stops. Currently, many people commuting from Gyeonggi-do to Seoul are experiencing significant inconvenience owing to the ban on standing in Red buses; a suitable level of input can be suggested for the input and expansion of chartered buses.

This paper is proposing a novel machine scheduling model for the unrelated parallel machine scheduling problem without setup times to minimize the total completion time, also known as “makespan”. This problem is a NP-complete problem, and to date, most approaches for real-life situations are based on the operator’s experience or simple heuristics. The new model based on the Memetic Algorithm, which was proposed by P. Moscato in 1989, is a hybrid algorithm that includes genetic algorithm and local search optimization. The new model is tested on randomly generated datasets, and is compared to optimal solution, and four scheduling models; three rule-based heuristic algorithms, and a genetic algorithm based scheduling model from literature; the test results show that the new model performed better than scheduling models from literature.

The current study, which consisted of two independent studies (laboratory and greenhouse), was carried out to project the hypothesis fungi-spray scheduling for leaf mold and gray leaf spot in tomato, as well as to evaluate the effect of temperature and leaf wet duration on the effectiveness of different fungicides against these diseases. In the first experiment, tomato leaves were infected with 1 × 104 conidia·mL-1 and put in a dew chamber for 0 to 18 hours at 10 to 25°C (Fulvia fulva) and 10 to 30°C (Stemphylium lycopersici). In farm study, tomato plants were treated for 240 hours with diluted (1,000 times) 30% trimidazole, 50% polyoxin B, and 40% iminoctadine tris (Belkut) for protection of leaf mold, and 10% etridiazole + 55% thiophanate-methyl (Gajiran), and 15% tribasic copper sulfate (Sebinna) for protection of gray leaf spot. In laboratory test, leaf condensation on the leaves of tomato plants were emerged after 9 hrs. of incubation. In conclusion, the incidence degree of leaf mold and gray leaf spot disease on tomato plants shows that it is very closely related to formation of leaf condensation, therefore the incidence of leaf mold was greater at 20 and 15°C, while 25 and 20°C enhanced the incidence of gray leaf spot. The incidence of leaf mold and gray leaf spot developed 20 days after inoculation, and the latency period was estimated to be 14‒15 days. Trihumin fungicide had the maximum effectiveness up to 168 hours of fungicides at 12 hours of wet duration in leaf mold, whereas Gajiran fungicide had the highest control (93%) against gray leaf spot up to 144 hours. All the chemicals showed an around 30‒50% decrease in effectiveness after 240 hours of treatment. The model predictions in present study could be help in timely, effective and ecofriendly management of leaf mold disease in tomato.

The printing process can have to print various colors with a limited capacity of printing facility such as ink containers that are needed cleaning to change color. In each container, cleaning time exists to assign corresponding inks, and it is considered as the setup cost required to reduce the increasing productivity. The existing manual method, which is based on the worker’s experience or intuition, is difficult to respond to the diversification of color requirements, mathematical modeling and algorithms are suggested for efficient scheduling. In this study, we propose a new type of scheduling problem for the printing process. First, we suggest a mathematical model that optimizes the color assignment and scheduling. Although the suggested model guarantees global optimality, it needs a lot of computational time to solve. Thus, we decompose the original problem into sequencing orders and allocating ink problems. An approximate function is used to compute the job scheduling, and local search heuristic based on 2-opt algorithm is suggested for reducing computational time. In order to verify the effectiveness of our method, we compared the algorithms' performance. The results show that the suggested decomposition structure can find acceptable solutions within a reasonable time. Also, we present schematized results for field application.

In this paper, we introduce a pilot's scheduling model which is able to maintain and balance their capabilities for each relevant skill level in military helicopter squadron. Flight scheduler has to consider many factors related pilot's flight information and spends a lot of times and efforts for flight planning without scientific process depending on his/her own capability and experience. This model reflected overall characteristics that include pilot's progression by basis monthly and cumulative flight hours, operational recent flight data and quickly find out a pinpoint areas of concern with respect to their mission subjects etc. There also include essential several constraints, such as personnel qualifications, and Army helicopter training policy’s constraints such as regulations and guidelines. We presented binary Integer Programming (IP) mathematical formulation for optimization and demonstrated its effectiveness by comparisons of real schedule versus model's solution to several cases experimental scenarios and greedy random simulation model. The model made the schedule in less than 30 minutes, including the data preprocessing process, and the results of the allocation were more equal than the actual one. This makes it possible to reduce the workload of the scheduler and effectively manages the pilot's skills. We expect to set up and improve better flight planning and combat readiness in Korea Army aviation.

Human and material resource planning is one representative example of Operations Research. Resource planning is important not only in civilian settings but also in military ones. In the Air Force, flight scheduling is one of the primary issues that must be addressed by the personnel who are connected to flight missions. However, although the topic is of great importance, relatively few studies have attempted to resolve the problem on a scientific basis. Each flight squadron has its own scheduling officers who manually draw up the flight schedules each day. While mistakes may not occur while drafting schedules, officers may experience difficulties in systematically adjusting to them. To increase efficiency in this context, this study proposes a mathematical model based on a binary variable. This model automatically drafts flight schedules considering pilot’s mission efficiency. Furthermore, it also recommends that schedules be drawn up monthly and updated weekly, rather than being drafted from scratch each day. This will enable easier control when taking the various relevant factors into account. The model incorporates several parameters, such as matching of the main pilots and co-pilots, turn around time, availability of pilots and aircraft, monthly requirements of each flight mission, and maximum/minimum number of sorties that would be flown per week. The optimal solution to this model demonstrated an average improvement of nearly 47% compared with other feasible solutions.

Many small and medium-sized manufacturing companies process various product types to respond different customer orders in a single production line. To improve their productivity, they often apply batch processing while considering various product types, constraints on batch sizes and setups, and due date of each order. This study introduces a batch scheduling heuristic for a production line with multiple product types and different due dates of each order. As the process times vary due to the different batch sizes and product types, a recursive equation is developed based on a flow line model to obtain the upper bound on the completion times with less computational complexity than full computation. The batch scheduling algorithm combines and schedules the orders with same product types into a batch to improve productivity, but within the constraints to match the due dates of the orders. The algorithm incorporates simple and intuitive principles for the purpose of being applied to small and medium companies. To test the algorithm, two case studies are introduced; a high pressure coolant (HPC) manufacturing line and a press process at a plate-type heat exchanger manufacturer. From the case studies, the developed algorithm provides significant improvements in setup frequency and thus convenience of workers and productivity, without violating due dates of each order.

To make a satisfactory decision regarding project scheduling, a trade-off between the resource-related cost and project duration must be considered. A beneficial method for decision makers is to provide a number of alternative schedules of diverse project duration with minimum resource cost. In view of optimization, the alternative schedules are Pareto sets under multi-objective of project duration and resource cost. Assuming that resource cost is closely related to resource leveling, a heuristic algorithm for resource capacity reduction (HRCR) is developed in this study in order to generate the Pareto sets efficiently. The heuristic is based on the fact that resource leveling can be improved by systematically reducing the resource capacity. Once the reduced resource capacity is given, a schedule with minimum project duration can be obtained by solving a resource-constrained project scheduling problem. In HRCR, VNS (Variable Neighborhood Search) is implemented to solve the resource-constrained project scheduling problem. Extensive experiments to evaluate the HRCR performance are accomplished with standard benchmarking data sets, PSPLIB. Considering 5 resource leveling objective functions, it is shown that HRCR outperforms well-known multi-objective optimization algorithm, SPEA2 (Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm-2), in generating dominant Pareto sets. The number of approximate Pareto optimal also can be extended by modifying weight parameter to reduce resource capacity in HRCR.

본 실험은 토마토(Solanum lycopersicum L. ‘Hoyong’ ‘Super Doterang’) 암면재배에서 배지 전체의 정전용량을 측정할 수 있는 장치(Substrate capacitance measurement device, SCMD)를 기반으로 한 적정 급액 방법을 구명하기 위하여 누적일사량 제어구(Integrated solar radiation automated irrigation, ISR)와 물관수액흐름 제어구(sap flow automated irrigation, SF)를 대조구로 비교하면서 봄부터 여름철과 겨울철에 재배를 실시하였다. SCMD 제어구는 급액 개시 후 배지 한 개당 설정된 배액 목표량이 처음 발생하는 시점까지 10분간격으로 급액하였고 첫 배액이 배출되면 그 때의 배지의 정전용량(Capacitance)을 100%로 간주하고 그 기준치의 급액제어 점(Capacitance threshold, CT)에 도달하면 급액 되었고 그 뒤 목표 배액량이 발생하면 급액이 멈추는 방식으로 제어되었다. 봄부터 여름재배에서 실험 처리를 위해 SCMD제어구의 일회 급액량 (Irrigation volume per event)을 50, 75, 또는 100mL로 설정하였고 겨울철 재배에서는 CT가 0.65, 0.75, 또는 0.90가 되면 급액 되도록 설정하였다. 봄부터 여름철 재배에서 일회 급액량을 50, 75, 100mL로 설정하였을 때 급액 횟수는 각각 39, 29, 19회 였고 배액율은 각각 3.04, 9.25, 20.18%였다. 겨울철 재 배에서 CT를 0.65, 0.75, 0.90로 설정하였을 때 급액횟수는 각각 5.67, 6.50, 14.67회였고 배액율은 9.91, 10.78, 35.3%였다. 봄부터 여름철 재배에서 일회 급액량 처리에 따른 물관수액흐름속도(SF) 변화는 1회 급액량과 배액량을 각각 50과 75mL로 제한한 경우 100mL로 제 한한 경우와 비교하여SF 신호가 외부 광량 신호 (SI) 보다 늦어지는 경향(time lag)을 보였고 겨울철 재배에서 CT를 0.65로 설정한 경우는 물관수액흐름 속도나 함수율이 매우 낮아졌고 CT를 0.90로 설정한 경우는 함수율과 물관수액흐름 속도는 매우 높았으나 많은 배액이 배출되었다. 따라서 토마토 봄부터 여름철 재배에서 SCMD를 활용하여 CT를 0.9로, 배지 한 개당 배액 목 표량을 100mL로 설정하였을 때 일회 급액량은 75~100mL 범위가 적합하고 겨울철 재배에서는 1회 급 액량을 75mL로, 배액 목표량을 70mL로 설정하였을 때 CT는 0.75이상 0.9이하 범위가 적합할 것으로 판단되었다. 앞으로 정전용량 값과 배지 용적수분함량의 관계성을 구명하고 보정계수를 구하는 연구가 필요할 것으로 판단된다.

In order to deal with high uncertainty and variability in emergency medical centers, many researchers have developed various models for their operational planning and scheduling. However, most of the models just provide static plans without any risk measures as their results, and thus the users often lose the opportunity to analyze how much risk the patients have, whether the plan is still implementable or how the plan should be changed when an unexpected event happens. In this study, we construct a simulation model combined with a risk-based planning and scheduling module designed by Simio LLC. In addition to static schedules, it provides possibility of treatment delay for each patient as a risk measure, and updates the schedule to avoid the risk when it is needed. By using the simulation model, the users can experiment various scenarios in operations quickly, and also can make a decision not based on their past experience or intuition but based on scientific estimation of risks even in urgent situations. An example of such an operational decision making process is demonstrated for a real mid-size emergency medical center located in Seoul, Republic of Korea. The model is designed for temporal short-term planning especially, but it can be expanded for long-term planning also with some appropriate adjustments.

We focus on the weapon target assignment and fire scheduling problem (WTAFSP) with the objective of minimizing the makespan, i.e., the latest completion time of a given set of firing operations. In this study, we assume that there are m available weapons to fire at n targets (> m). The artillery attack operation consists of two steps of sequential procedure : assignment of weapons to the targets; and scheduling firing operations against the targets that are assigned to each weapon. This problem is a combination of weapon target assignment problem (WTAP) and fire scheduling problem (FSP). To solve this problem, we define the problem with a mixed integer programming model. Then, we develop exact algorithms based on a dynamic programming technique. Also, we suggest how to find lower bounds and upper bounds to a given problem. To evaluate the performance of developed exact algorithms, computational experiments are performed on randomly generated problems. From the results, we can see suggested exact algorithm solves problems of a medium size within a reasonable amount of computation time. Also, the results show that the computation time required for suggested exact algorithm can be seen to increase rapidly as the problem size grows. We report the result with analysis and give directions for future research for this study. This study is meaningful in that it suggests an exact algorithm for a more realistic problem than existing researches. Also, this study can provide a basis for developing algorithms that can solve larger size problems.

The manufacturing companies under Make-To-Order (MTO) production environment face highly variable requirements of the customers. It makes them difficult to establish preemptive production strategy through inventory management and demand forecasting. Therefore, the ability to establish an optimal production schedule that incorporates the various requirements of the customers is emphasized as the key success factor. In this study, we suggest a process of designing the simulation model for establishing production schedule and apply this model to the case of a flat glass processing company. The flat glass manufacturing industry is under MTO production environment. Academic research of flat glass industry is focused on minimizing the waste in the cutting process. In addition, in the practical view, the flat glass manufacturing companies tend to establish the production schedule based on the intuition of production manager and it results in failure of meeting the due date. Based on these findings, the case study aims to present the process of drawing up a production schedule through simulation modeling. The actual data of Korean flat glass processing company were used to make a monthly production schedule. To do this, five scenarios based on dispatching rules are considered and each scenario is evaluated by three key performance indicators for delivery compliance. We used B2MML (Business To Manufacturing Markup Language) schema for integrating manufacturing systems and simulations are carried out by using SIMIO simulation software. The results provide the basis for determining a suitable production schedule from the production manager's perspective.

This study focuses on a job-shop scheduling problem with the objective of minimizing total tardiness for the job orders that have different due dates and different process flows. We suggest the dispatching rule based scheduling algorithm to generate fast and efficient schedule. First, we show the delay schedule can be optimal for total tardiness measure in some cases. Based on this observation, we expand search space for selecting the job operation to explore the delay schedules. That means, not only all job operations waiting for process but also job operations not arrived at the machine yet are considered to be scheduled when a machine is available and it is need decision for the next operation to be processed. Assuming each job operation is assigned to the available machine, the expected total tardiness is estimated, and the job operation with the minimum expected total tardiness is selected to be processed in the machine. If this job is being processed in the other machine, then machine should wait until the job arrives at the machine. Simulation experiments are carried out to test the suggested algorithm and compare with the results of other well-known dispatching rules such as EDD, ATC and COVERT, etc. Results show that the proposed algorithm, MET, works better in terms of total tardiness of orders than existing rules without increasing the number of tardy jobs.

This paper considers the problem of scheduling loading and unloading operations of a crane in a railway terminal motivated from rail-road container transshipment operations at Uiwang Inland Container Depot (ICD). Unlike previous studies only considering the total handling time of containers, this paper considers a bi-criteria objective of minimizing the weighted sum of the total handling time and tenant service time. The tenant service time is an important criterion in terms of terminal tenants who are private logistics companies in charge of moving containers from/to the terminal using their trucks. In the rail-road container shipment yard, the tenant service time of a tenant can be defined by a time difference between beginning and finishing loading and unloading operations of a crane. Thus, finding a set of sequences and time of the crane operations becomes a crucial decision issue in the problem. The problem is formulated as a nonlinear program which is improved by linearizing a nonlinear constraint in the model. This paper develops a genetic algorithm to solve the problem and performs a case study on the Uiwang ICD terminal. Computational experiment results show that the genetic algorithm shows better performance than commercial optimization solvers. Operational implications in terms of tenants are drawn through sensitivity analyses.