Use of substitute scalarizing functions to guide a local search based heuristic: The case of moTSP

Solving the Tchebycheff program means optimizing a particular scalarizing function. When dealing with combinatorial problems, however, it is due to computational intractability often necessary to apply heuristics and settle for approximations to the optimal solution. The experiments in this paper suggest that for the multiobjective travelling salesman problem (moTSP) instances considered, heuristic optimization of the Tchebycheff program gives better results when using a substitute scalarizing function instead of the Tchebycheff based one to guide the local search path. Two families of substitute scalarizing functions are considered.