The Set Covering Problem solved by The Black Hole Algorithm

The Set Covering Problem is a classical problem in combinatorial optimization that belongs to the Karp's 21 NP-hard problems, with many practical applications. In this paper, an approach based on Black Hole Algorithm is proposed to solve this problem. The black hole algorithm is a metaheuristic that is inspired by nature, especially by the black hole phenomenon in space. To improve the performance of metaheuristics are used repairing operator, which those solutions that violate the constraints, preprocessing accelerate the resolution of the problem, and transfer function and discretization function to adapts the solutions to a binary domains. We report interesting and competitive experimental results on a set of 45 instances preprocessed the Set Covering Problem.