A variable neighbourhood search method to solve hierarchically engineering design problems

In this paper, a Variable Neighborhood Search (VNS) method is used to solve hierarchically engineering design problems. This method is adapted to solve problems with any type of variables, i.e. integer, discrete and continuous variables. In the proposed method, a decent algorithm with an adaptive memory is used to perform solutions by three systematic transformations techniques. This method allows finding high-quality solutions in short computational time. Computational results prove that, and demonstrate that the proposed Hierarchical VNS (HR-VNS) method performs all methods presented in the literature for engineering design problems.