Optimization for Chemical Engineering

The introductory chapter gives a brief historical prospective, the relation to other subjects, The second chapter describes analytical methods for unconstrained and constrained problems and serves as a foundation for the subjects that follow. The third chapter is on the most widely used optimization technique, linear programming; and it includes an illustration of the application of a commercial code to an industrial plant. In the fourth chapter, single variable search methods based on the minimax concept are given along with a FORTRAN program for Fibonacci search. In the fifth chapter constrained direct methods are emphasized. The important algorithms for optimizing a nonlinear economic model with nonlinear constraints have been described, and their performance has been reviewed. In the sixth chapter some of the variables have integer values in the constraints with the other constraints being linear, and the branch and bound method is illustrated for optimization of these types of problems. In the seventh chapter, the sequential partial optimization procedure of dynamic programming is developed, as are concepts of resource allocation and optimization through time. In the eighth chapter, the text is concluded with a chapter on variational methods that gives the important results for obtaining an optimum function rather than an optimum point.