An exponential (matching based) neighborhood for the vehicle routing problem

We introduce an exponential neighborhood for the Vehicle Routing Problem (vrp) with unit customers’ demands, and we show that it can be explored efficiently in polynomial time by reducing its exploration to a particular case of the Restricted Complete Matching (rcm) problem that we prove to be polynomial time solvable using flow techniques. Furthermore, we show that in the general case with non-unit customers’ demands the exploration of the neighborhood becomes an -hard problem.     

Multiple-shrinkage estimators of means in exponential families

Shrinkage estimators are often obtained by adjusting the usual estimator towards a target subspace to which the true parameter might belong. However, meaningful reductions in risk below the usual estimator can typically be achieved in a very small part of the parameter space. In the multivariate-normal mean estimation problem, E. George, in a series of papers, showed how multiple-shrinkage estimators (data-weighted averages of several different shrinkage estimators) can attain substantial risk reductions in a large part of the parameter space. This paper extends the multiple-shrinkage results to the case of simultaneous estimation of the means of several one-parameter exponential families. Our results are developed by using an identity similar to that of Haff and Johnson (1986). A computer simulation is reported to indicate the magnitude of reductions in risk. Our results are also applied to the problem of how to choose appropriate component variables to combine before a suitable shrinkage estimator is considered.