We investigate in this paper the problem of model collisions in the Dissimilarity Self Organizing Map (SOM). This extension of the SOM to dissimilarity data suffers from constraints imposed on the model representation, that lead to some strong map folding: several units share a common prototype. We propose in this paper an efficient way to address this problem via a branch and bound approach.

The paper describes a procedure for mixed integer programming that allows branches to be imposed 'by degrees', which can subsequently be revised or weeded out according to their relative influence. It is an adaptive approach in which the branch and bound tree can be maillipulated and rl'Structured. The approach also yields measures of the costs of imposing the branches that lead to integer solu...

Branch and bound algorithms are methods for global optimization in nonconvex problems [LW66, Moo91]. They are nonheuristic, in the sense that they maintain a provable upper and lower bound on the (globally) optimal objective value; they terminate with a certificate proving that the suboptimal point found is ǫ-suboptimal. Branch and bound algorithms can be (and often are) slow, however. In the w...

While a great portion of the scheduling literature focuses on time-based criteria, the most important goal of management is maximizing the profitability of the firm. In this paper, the net preset value criterion is studied taking account of linear time-dependent cash flows in single machine and flow shop scheduling problems. First, a heuristic method is presented for the single machine scheduli...

While a great portion of the scheduling literature focuses on time-based criteria, the most important goal of management is maximizing the profitability of the firm. In this paper, the net preset value criterion is studied taking account of linear time-dependent cash flows in single machine and flow shop scheduling problems. First, a heuristic method is presented for the single machine scheduli...

In this paper a discrete competitive neural network is introduced to calculate the optimal robot arm movements for processing a considered commitment of tasks, using the branch and bound methodology. A special method based on the branch and bound methodology, modified with a travelling path for adapting in the neural network, is introduced. The main neural network of the system consists of diff...