ABSTRACT A Review of Simulation Optimization Techniques

One of the primary and most important uses of simulations is for optimization. Optimization consists of selecting simulation configuration parameters that can minimize (or maximize) output attributes of the scenario, based on a set of input attributes. For example, a product manufacturer may wish to find the number of factories, workers, and pieces of equipment that will yield the highest return per investment. This is often a difficult problem, because complex simulations can rarely be expressed as a continuous function in which standard calculus optimization techniques can be employed. There are, however, several popular techniques that have been developed over the years, and successfully used to optimize complex simulations. This paper provides a survey of three recent, practical techniques, and a brief discussion of major software simulation packages that employ them