This paper presents an asymptotic analysis of control models governed by stochastic ordinary differential equations. A sufficient condition of near-optimal controls is given based on Ekeland's principle. It is shown that, under some concavity assumptions, the e-maximum condition in terms of the...

This paper presents an asymptotic analysis of hierarchical production planning in a general manufacturing system consisting of a network of unreliable machines producing a variety of products. The concept of a dynamic job shop is introduced by interpreting the system as a directed graph, and the...

This paper studies deterministic dynamic two-machine flowshops. Optimal feedback controls are obtained explicitly. A capacity loss phenomenon is observed when the capacity of the second machine exceeds that of the first. The phenomenon has important implications for the solution of the...

We consider a single machine, multiproduct manufacturing system, which can operate at finitely many quality levels. The quality of the machine deteriorates according to a continuous-time Markov process and the only way to improve the quality is by replacing the machine by a new one. In this...

This paper is concerned with near-optimal control of manufacturing systems consisting of two unreliable machines in tandem and having the objective of minimizing the total discounted cost of inventories/shortages over an infinite horizon. Asymptotic optimal feedback controls are constructed with...

This paper presents an extension of earlier research on heirarchical control of stochastic manufacturing systems with linear production costs. A new method is introduced to construct asymptotically optimal open-loop and feedback controls for manufacturing systems in which the rates of machine...

This paper presents an asymptotic analysis of hierarchical production planning in a manufacturing system with two tandem machines that are subject to breakdown and repair. The system produces a single product, whose rate of demand over time is given to be constant. The problem is formulated as a...

In this paper, we treat an optimal control problem of a stochastic two-machine flowshop with machines subject to random breakdown and repair. While the problem is difficult to solve, it can be approximated by a deterministic problem when the rates of machine failure and repair become large....