A Tree Search Algorithm for Solving theContainer Loading Problem

The paper presents a tree search algorithm for the three-dimensional container loading problem(3D-CLP). The 3D-CLP is the problem of loading a subset of a given set of rectangularboxes into a rectangular container so that the packed volume is maximized. The method hastwo variants: the packing variant guarantees full support from below for all packed boxes,while this constraint is not taken into account by the cutting variant. The guillotine cut constraintis considered by both variants. The method is mainly based on two concepts. On theone hand the block building approach is generalized.[...]