Quantum and classical approaches to the optimization of highway platooning: the two-vehicle matching problem

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Onah, Chinonso, Guin, Agneev, Othmer, Carsten, Montañez-Barrera, J. A., Michielsen, Kristel
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866914409297739776
author Onah, Chinonso
Guin, Agneev
Othmer, Carsten
Montañez-Barrera, J. A.
Michielsen, Kristel
author_facet Onah, Chinonso
Guin, Agneev
Othmer, Carsten
Montañez-Barrera, J. A.
Michielsen, Kristel
contents Aerodynamic drag reduction on highways through vehicle platooning is a well-known concept, but it has not yet seen systematic uptake, arguably because of significant technological and legislative obstacles. As a low-tech entry point to real multi-vehicle platooning, "Windbreaking-as-a-Service" (WaaS) was introduced recently. Here we use a QUBO formulation to study classical metaheuristics such as simulated annealing and tabu search, together with emerging quantum heuristics including quantum annealing and variants of the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA). These heuristic solvers do not guarantee optimality, but they traverse the same higher-order landscape using polynomial memory. They can also be parallelized aggressively, and efficient classical post-processing can be used in hybrid workflows to return only valid schedules. This paper therefore positions QUBO as a common language that allows heterogeneous classical, quantum, and hybrid solvers to address the optimization of highway platooning.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2603_18919
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Quantum and classical approaches to the optimization of highway platooning: the two-vehicle matching problem
Onah, Chinonso
Guin, Agneev
Othmer, Carsten
Montañez-Barrera, J. A.
Michielsen, Kristel
Quantum Physics
Emerging Technologies
Applied Physics
Aerodynamic drag reduction on highways through vehicle platooning is a well-known concept, but it has not yet seen systematic uptake, arguably because of significant technological and legislative obstacles. As a low-tech entry point to real multi-vehicle platooning, "Windbreaking-as-a-Service" (WaaS) was introduced recently. Here we use a QUBO formulation to study classical metaheuristics such as simulated annealing and tabu search, together with emerging quantum heuristics including quantum annealing and variants of the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA). These heuristic solvers do not guarantee optimality, but they traverse the same higher-order landscape using polynomial memory. They can also be parallelized aggressively, and efficient classical post-processing can be used in hybrid workflows to return only valid schedules. This paper therefore positions QUBO as a common language that allows heterogeneous classical, quantum, and hybrid solvers to address the optimization of highway platooning.
title Quantum and classical approaches to the optimization of highway platooning: the two-vehicle matching problem
topic Quantum Physics
Emerging Technologies
Applied Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18919