This book is the result of my research perfonned at the University Kiel under the supervision of Professor Dr. Andreas Drexl. I am very grateful to him for suggesting the subject as well as for his guidance and support during the preparation. Professor Dr. Klaus Brockhoff deserves thanks for under- taking the task of the secondary assessment. The Institut fur Betriebswirtschaftslehre in Kiel and especially my col- leagues Dr. Knut Haase, Carsten Jordan, AlfKimrns, and Dr. Frank Salewski provided a stimulating environment. Particularly, I am indebted to Dr. Arno Sprecher and Andreas Schinner....

Part of the "Production and Logistics" series, this book discusses the suitability of genetic algorithms for production scheduling, and presents an approach which produces results comparable with those of more tailored optimization techniques.

This book is the outcome of my research in the field of multi levellot sizing and scheduling which started in May 1993 at the Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel (Germany). During this time I discovered more and more interesting aspects ab out this subject and I had to learn that not every promising idea can be thoroughly evaluated by one person alone. Nevertheless, I am now in the position to present some results which are supposed to be useful for future endeavors. Since April 1995 the work was done with partial support from the research project no. Dr 170/4-1 from the "Deutsche For...