A genetic algorithm for manufacturing cell formation by considering manufacturing flexibility

As a promising manufacturing technology, cellular manufacturing (CM) has attracted much attention by researchers and practitioners during the past two decades. Many heuristics and optimization-based models have been developed to solve the cell formation (CF) problem-the first step towards achieving CM. Genetic algorithm (GA) has been suggested as one of a viable solution alternative. This paper proposes a mathematical programming model to describe the cell formation by considering cell autonomy and manufacturing flexibility. A genetic algorithm (GA) based approach is presented to solve the problem. Our computational tests show that such approach is fairly effective in improving solution quality.