A memetic algorithm for the minimum sum coloring problem

Given an undirected graph $G$, the Minimum Sum Coloring problem (MSCP) is to find a legal assignment of colors (represented by natural numbers) to each vertex of $G$ such that the total sum of the colors assigned to the vertices is minimized. This paper presents a memetic algorithm for MSCP based on a tabu search procedure with two neighborhoods and a multi-parent crossover operator. Experiments on a set of 77 well-known DIMACS and COLOR 2002-2004 benchmark instances show that the proposed algorithm achieves highly competitive results in comparison with five state-of-the-art algorithms. In particular, the proposed algorithm can improve the best known results for 17 instances. We also provide upper bounds for 18 additional instances for the first time.