The minimum sum coloring problem (MSCP) and the bandwidth coloring problem (BCP) are two important generalizations of the classical vertex coloring problem with numerous applications in diverse domains, including VLSI design, scheduling, resource allocation and frequency assignment in mobile networks, etc. Since the MSCP and BCP are NP-hard problems, heuristics and metaheuristics are practical solution methods to obtain high quality solutions in an acceptable computing time. This thesis is dedicated to developing effective hybrid metaheuristic algorithms for the MSCP and BCP. For the MSCP, we present two memetic algorithms which combine population-based evolutionary search and local search. An effective algorithm for maximum independent set...