Ant colony optimization for automated storage and retrieval system

In this work, we first propose an NP-hard combinatorial problem, that is, the storage and retrieve (S/R) machine travel path optimization for batch order picking (BOP). Successful solving this problem is valuable to many application areas such inventory items in logistics and work-in-process storage in manufacturing systems. And then, we investigate the feasibility of using ant colony optimization (ACO) meta-heuristics to address the proposed problem. Simulation tests are executed separately based on two ACO algorithms. Finally, the S/R machine operating performance measure index such as total travel distance and total travel time are employed to evaluate the experimental results achieved by different ACO algorithms. Experimental case study demonstrates the effectiveness and applicability of the selected ACO approaches to our proposed BOP problem.