Letter to the Editor—The Multidimensional Assignment Problem

Abstract

The multidimensional assignment problem is a higher dimensional version of the standard (two-dimensional) assignment problem in the literature. The higher dimensions can be thought of as time or space dimensions or both. An algorithm is proposed for the solution of the multi-index assignment problem. The algorithm is based on a tree search technique of the branch-and-bound variety. It uses dual subproblems to provide easily computed bounds for the primal assignment problem.