A novel memory-based simulated annealing algorithm to solve multi-line facility layout problem

In this paper, a memory-based simulated annealing algorithm called the Dual Memory Simulated Annealing Algorithm (DMSA) is presented to solve multi-line facility layout problems. The objective is to minimize the total material handling cost. Two memory buffers and a restart mechanism are considered. Two benchmark problems were selected from the literature review papers and solved using the standard simulated annealing (SA) algorithm and the DMSA. The obtained results show that solutions provided by the DMSA algorithm are cost-effective compared to the standard SA algorithm and the other algorithms used for solving these test cases. Moreover, to further evaluate the performance of the DMSA algorithm in large scale problems, eleven test cases were selected from the benchmark library of the quadratic assignment problem (QAP). According to the results, the performance of the algorithm in finding solutions to complex problems is exemplary.