The Classic Diet Problem

The classic diet problem involves minimizing the cost of supplying patients with required nutrients.

“The diet problem is famous in the literature of linear programming because it is the first economic problem ever solved by the explicit use of this method. It was originally intended merely to serve as an illustration and test of the use of the method, but, like many toy models, it has turned out to have unexpected but important practical applications. The essential issue in this problem is that a diet to be acceptable must meet certain quality specifications; e.g., it must contain so many calories, so many units of riboflavin, etc.”.

The Classic Diet Problem