Corner Occupying Theorem for the Two-dimensional Integral Rectangle Packing Problem

Abstract: This paper proves a corner occupying theorem for the two-dimensional integral rectangle packing problem, stating that if it is possible to orthogonally place n arbitrarily given integral rectangles into an integral rectangular container without overlapping, then we can achieve a feasible packing by successively placing an integral rectangle onto a bottom-left corner in the container. Based on this theorem, we might develop efficient heuristic algorithms for solving the integral rectangle packing problem. In fact, as a vague conjecture, this theorem has been implicitly mentioned with different appearances by many people for a long time.