Solving the Traveling Salesperson Problem with Mathematica

Problem

電車でこんな広告を見かけました😁📸 pic.twitter.com/iXEgvtXrpL

— 早稲田大学 早水桃子研究室 (@hayamizu_lab) October 11, 2022

Solution

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d=SparseArray[{{1,2}->10,{2,1}->10,{1,5}->15,{5,1}->15,{1,4}->12,{4,1}->12,{1,3}->20,{3,1}->20,{2,5}->10,{5,2}->10,{3,4}->10,{4,3}->10,{3,8}->30,{8,3}->30,{3,7}->20,{7,3}->20,{3,6}->25,{6,3}->25,{4,5}->15,{5,4}->15,{4,8}->20,{8,4}->20,{5,9}->18,{9,5}->18,{5,8}->15,{8,5}->15,{6,7}->5,{7,6}->5,{7,8}->35,{8,7}->35,{8,9}->12,{9,8}->12},{9,9},Infinity];

We create a matrix using the SparseArray function. Each element represents the distance between cities at the row and column of that element. For example, the first element {1,2}->10 means the distance between 1 and 2 is 10. The second to last element {9,9} indicates the size of the matrix, and the final element Infinity means the length of paths between unspecified cities is infinite, meaning there is no path.

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{len,tour}=FindShortestTour[{1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9},DistanceFunction->(d[[#1,#2]]&)]

You can easily solve the traveling salesperson problem with the FindShortestTour function. {1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9} represents the city numbers. DistanceFunction->(d[[#1,#2]]&) passes the matrix d which represents the distance between cities.

Output

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{137, {1, 2, 5, 9, 8, 7, 6, 3, 4}}

The output gives the shortest distance and the tour route for it. The shortest distance is 137, and the route is 1→2→5→9→8→7→6→3→4→1. Converting this to ABC order gives A, B, E, I, H, G, F, C, D.