ABSTRACT

Optimization is everywhere, as nothing at all takes place in the universe, in which some rule of maximum or minimum does not appear. It is the human nature to seek for the best among the available alternatives. An optimization problem is characterized by its specific objective function that is to be maximized or minimized, depending upon the problem and, in the case of a constrained problem, a given set of constraints. Possible objective functions include expressions representing profits, costs, market share, portfolio risk, etc. Possible constraints include those that represent limited budgets or resources, nonnegativity constraints on the variables, conservation equations, etc.