TY - JOUR
T1 - An efficient searching method for minimal path vectors in multi-state networks
AU - Lin, Yi-Kuei
AU - Chen, Shin Guang
PY - 2019/1/1
Y1 - 2019/1/1
N2 - Searching for minimal path vectors (MPVs) is an important topic in solving network related problems, especially for the evaluation of network reliability. One of the popular approaches, namely the three-stage method (TSM), is influenced deeply on the efficiency of searching for minimal path vectors in multi-state networks (MSN). TSM consists of three stages, i.e., searching for all minimal path sets, searching for all MPVs, and calculating union probability on MPVs. After reviewing previous works in the literaure, this paper proposes a more efficient method based on cyclic check on the candidates of MPVs, which can do an efficient searching for MPVs in MSNs and even reduce the three-step approach to two-step approach. Benchmarking with the well-known algorithms are made in this paper, and more complicated networks are also examined for verification of the proposed method.
AB - Searching for minimal path vectors (MPVs) is an important topic in solving network related problems, especially for the evaluation of network reliability. One of the popular approaches, namely the three-stage method (TSM), is influenced deeply on the efficiency of searching for minimal path vectors in multi-state networks (MSN). TSM consists of three stages, i.e., searching for all minimal path sets, searching for all MPVs, and calculating union probability on MPVs. After reviewing previous works in the literaure, this paper proposes a more efficient method based on cyclic check on the candidates of MPVs, which can do an efficient searching for MPVs in MSNs and even reduce the three-step approach to two-step approach. Benchmarking with the well-known algorithms are made in this paper, and more complicated networks are also examined for verification of the proposed method.
KW - Cyclic check
KW - Fast enumeration
KW - Minimal path sets
KW - Minimal path vectors
KW - Network reliability
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85061272437&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10479-019-03158-6
DO - 10.1007/s10479-019-03158-6
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85061272437
JO - Annals of Operations Research
JF - Annals of Operations Research
SN - 0254-5330
ER -