HEURISTIC AND EXACT SOLUTION METHOD FOR CONVEX NONLINEAR KNAPSACK PROBLEM

In this paper, we consider a class of convex nonlinear knapsack problems in which all decision variables are integer and the objective and knapsack functions are nonlinear. This generalized problem is characterized by positive marginal cost (PMC) and increasing marginal loss-cost ratio (IMLCR). By analyzing the structural properties of the problem, we develop an efficient heuristic and propose search and branching rules to improve the branch and bound method for solving exact solution. Numerical study is done for showing the effectiveness of the proposed heuristic and the modified branch and bound method.