UMass INFORMS Student Chapter

A week and a day have passed since the 2024 INFORMS Annual Meeting wrapped up in Seattle, Washington.

Though we’re back in Amherst, the excitement from our time at the Seattle Convention Center Summit, and Hyatt Regency stays with us. Seattle gifted us a few moments of sunshine amid its rain, adding a bright touch to our experience.

Our faculty advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney, opened the first day with a compelling presentation, “Defense Critical Supply Chain Networks and Risk Management with the Inclusion of Labor: Dynamics and Quantification of Performance and the Ranking of Nodes and Links.”

Professor Nagurney participated in multiple panels and meetings. She also participated in the panel “What Does Our Past Tell Us About the Future” and attended a vibrant Editorial Board meeting for the Journal of Global Optimization and Optimization Letters. Professor Nagurney was joined by her current PhD students, Ismael M. Pour, Samira Samadi, both presenting for the first time, and Dana Hassani. It was also wonderful to reconnect with her former PhD students Professors Pritha Dutta and Grace Ke.

Our former Chapter President, Dana Hassani, presented his work, “A Multiperiod Multicommodity Capacitated International Agricultural Trade Network Equilibrium Model with Applications to Ukraine in Wartime,” during a session on Disaster Response Operations and Social Responsibility. Congratulations to Dana on his achievements, including his recent publication in Transportation Science!

Our current President, Ismael M. Pour, presented his paper, “A Spatial Price Network Equilibrium Paradox,” during the session on “Survival Analysis and Optimization Techniques,” on the last day of the conference.

Our current Vice President, Joshua Gladstone, presented his work, “Pricing And Convenience Considerations In Omnichannel Assortment Planning,” in the session titled “Retail Analytics; and Assortment Planning,” on the last day of the conference.

Our current Treasurer, Samira Samadi, also marked her first INFORMS conference by presenting the paper “A Variational Inequality Trade Network Model in Prices and Quantities Under Commodity Losses,” co-authored with Professor Nagurney and Ismael M. Pour. We’re thrilled to announce that just after returning to Amherst, this paper was published.

One of our Social Media Officers, Semih Boz, shared his research, “Parcel Consolidation In Last Mile Delivery by Vehicle and Drone,” during the session on “Improving Societal Outcomes with Logistical Innovations” on the first day of the conference. Our other Social Media Officer, Gulten Busra Karkili, presented her work in the session “Innovations in Public Sector Operations,” on the last day of the conference.

One of our Blog post Officers, Yukti Kathuria, presented her work, “Analysis of Social Determinants of Health to Risk-Stratify Type II Diabetes Pathways,” in a flash session on “Data Science in Healthcare and Policy” on the second day of the conference. Our other Blog post Officer, Sindhoora Prakash, shared her research, “A Comparative Study Of Scheduling Approaches For Complex Care Programs with Multi-disciplinary Teams,” during the session on “Healthcare Operations” on the last day of the conference.

This year, the INFORMS Annual Meeting was record-breaking in scale, with so many sessions that navigating the app was an adventure! Many of our Chapter members presented, some for the first time, showcasing the depth and diversity of our research. For instance, Solmaz Abbaspour presented her research, “Equitable Supply-Demand Balancing: Tailoring Equitable Incentives for Demand Response Programs in Power Grids,” in the session “Recycling, Repurposing and Rebalancing in Precision Agriculture and Sustainable Systems” on the first day. Kelvin Ekun also presented his work, “Online Quotation Under Delayed Customer Feedback and Offline Production Scheduling,” during the session “Scheduling of Manufacturing and Service Processes” on the last day of the conference.

The highlight came at the Student Chapter Award Ceremony, where the UMass Amherst INFORMS Student Chapter received the Magna Cum Laude Award. This achievement reflects the guidance of our faculty advisor Professor Anna Nagurney and the leadership of our previous President Dana Hassani, and the dedication of all our Chapter members. This recognition embodies the hard work of our officers and the invaluable members.

Next week, we’ll gather for a photoshoot with our award. We are excited for the next INFORMS Annual Meeting in Atlanta and look forward to seeing all of our colleagues there!

On October 11, 2024, we hosted a Tune-Up session where five of our student members presented their research and received valuable feedback from peers and faculty. Notably, for many of these students, this year’s INFORMS Annual Meeting will be their first experience attending this prestigious conference focused on Operations Research and Management Science.

The session began with lunch as everyone helped themselves to pizza and coffee while the speakers prepared to get their presentations set up.

Professor Nagurney also congratulated the student chapter officers for winning the Magna Cum Laude award for their activities. She further thanked all the presenters, faculty, and peers who showed up to give feedback to the students.

Our president, Ismael Pour, introduced the first presenter, Solmaz Abbaspour, who gave an illuminating talk on equitable supply-demand balancing.

Following Solmaz, Samira gave an exciting talk about trade network models under commodity losses. Ismael’s presentation on the price network equilibrium paradox was highly engaging. This was followed by Busra, who spoke about strategic frameworks for social welfare programs. Finally, Dana presented his work on multi-period, multi-commodity, capacitated international trade network models.

The audience was engaged throughout all the interesting presentations and had many questions, feedback, and suggestions for the speakers.

The session ended on a positive note, and all the presenters felt encouraged and prepared for their future presentations at the conference. We extend our sincere gratitude to all the students who volunteered to present at the Tune-Up session, as well as to the students and especially the faculty who attended and provided the presenters with valuable feedback. The insights shared during the event will help refine the research presentations, which will be showcased at this year’s INFORMS Annual Meeting.

Be sure to stay connected by regularly checking our blog and social media platforms, where we’ll continue to share updates on upcoming events and other exciting news.

As the new academic year begins and students return to campus, UMass INFORMS is excited to organize a variety of engaging events once again. On September 27, 2024, we kicked off the semester with our first event featuring Dr. Muge Capan, Assistant Professor of Industrial Engineering at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Dr. Capan delivered an insightful presentation titled “Improving Diagnostic Equity in Ambulatory Settings: Research to Practice.”

Our new president, Ismael, welcomed Professor Capan and provided a brief introduction to her background.

Our faculty advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney, welcomed Dr. Capan and expressed our gratitude for her acceptance of our invitation. She also congratulated Professor Capan on being featured on the university website for two consecutive days.

During her presentation, Dr. Capan shared an overview of her ongoing research projects across three key areas: diagnostic decision-making, provider workload, and maternal health, with a focus on diagnostic decision-making for this talk. Her project is structured into three parts: identifying and conceptualizing tools for addressing diagnostic errors and conducting chart reviews; analyzing the incidence of diagnostic errors and decision-making under uncertainty; and quantifying distributional disparities among patient subpopulations.

Following the presentation, the audience engaged with Dr. Capan by asking many thoughtful questions. There were several inquiries from PhD students in both the Isenberg School of Management and the MIE department, as well as questions from Professor Solak, the Chair of the OIM Department, Professor Hari Balasubramanian, and Professor Nagurney.

Refreshments, including coffee and bagels, were provided for both the speaker and the audience. Although the delivery was a bit late, our new officers handled the situation calmly, as one would expect from those in the operations research field. While the food was delightful, it was the company that truly made the occasion memorable.

As always, stay tuned for more exciting events at UMass Amherst, whether during this fall semester or in the future. Our next planned event will be the 2024 INFORMS Annual Meeting Tune-Up, and we hope to see you there!

The Fall 24′ semester officially started on Tuesday, September 3, at UMass Amherst and the campus is lively and full of bright faces of students once again.

UMass INFORMS Student Chapter had its first open meeting of the 2024-2025 academic year to decide on the officer roster, possible events, and prospective guest speakers. Our Chapter is now 20 years old, that is, 20 years of activity, seminars, social events, connections, and service. We will be celebrating Chapter’s 20th anniversary in our future events.

Please tune up to our blog and social media to hear about our activities in this academic year. We plan to have many exciting events as the semester unfolds.

As we highlighted in a previous post, the Chapter’s Vice President, Sindhoora Prakash, and our Social Media Officer, Yukti Kathuria, are the winners of the Technology Association of Georgia (Tag) Master Competition, which was co-sponsored by INFORMS.

Our officers received their award in April while attending the INFORMS Analytics Conference in Orlando, Florida. We are glad to see that Sindhoora and Yukti’s achievement has been covered in UMass news. You can read the post here.

On Thursday, May 9, 2024, we held our end-of-semester party. At UMass Amherst, this marked the final week of classes before finals, providing us with a well-deserved opportunity for fun and peace of mind. We gathered in the executive classroom N135 of the Douglas and Diana Berthiaume Business Innovation Hub, recently renamed in honor of Douglas and Diana Berthiaume, the most generous cash donors in the history of Isenberg School of Management and UMass Amherst.

Officers, many of our members, and faculty from Isenberg School of Management and the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering joined us, creating a delightful evening of company and connection.

There were lots of delicious food, including pizza, sandwiches, salad, and fruit, plus Ukrainian pierogies and desserts, kindly provided by our faculty advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney.

Professor Nagurney presented officers from last academic year and this year with signed and framed certificates for outstanding service to the UMass Amherst INFORMS Student Chapter. This gesture came as a delightful surprise following officers’ hard work in organizing numerous seminars and social activities.

UMass INFORMS has always been a platform for learning and connectivity for our students and faculty. We are proud to maintain this platform at such high levels of activity year after year, and we are grateful for all the resultant friendships and memories.

While this marks the Chapter’s last event of the academic year, we will be back next year with more exciting seminars and events. Many members are already planning for the 2024 INFORMS Annual Meeting in Seattle.

As always, please stay updated on our blog and social media for future events and activities.

The past month was fruitful for UMass INFORMS Chapter officers as they achieved notable accomplishments. This post commemorates and celebrates these acheivements.

Our Vice-President, Sindhoora Prakash, and Blog Manager, Yukti Kathuria, embarked on their journey for the TAG Master Modeler Competition 2024 in February. Their team was titled “OR”ganized Chaos. They traveled to Atlanta, Georgia last month and emerged victorious in the TAG Master Modeler Competition.

Their work supports the noble cause of the Davis Direction Foundation in helping people to combat addiction.

Later, Sindhoora and Yukti presented the results of their impactful research at the INFORMS Analytics Conference in Orlando, Florida.

Their motto is to “continue leveraging data for meaningful impact and positive change.” The UMass INFORMS Chapter is proud to have had Sindhoora and Yukti serve as officers this academic year.

Additionally, this week, our President, Dana Hassani, was honored as the recipient of the Exceptional Impact Scholarship from the Operations and Information Management department at the Isenberg School of Management, recognizing his research activities during this academic year.

Our faculty advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney, presented the award certificate to Dana. Professor Nagurney also serves as Dana’s PhD supervisor.

Congratulations to Sindhoora, Yukti, and Dana for their achievements. We will celebrate their and our other officers’ accomplishments, as well as all the Chapter’s activities in the past academic year, at our End-of-Semester Party next week. Make sure to check our blog for coverage and photos of the event.

As always, please stay updated on our blog and social media outlets as we continue to organize many exciting events.

On Friday, April 5, the UMass INFORMS community had the pleasure of attending a lecture by Professor Chandra Bhat, Joe J. King Endowed Chair Professor in Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin and the Editor of Transportation Research B. The talk was part of the Boyer Lecture Series, organized by Professor Mike Knodler, the Boyer Professor and Director of the UMass Transportation Center. Professor Knodler invited UMass INFORMS and its faculty advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney, to help coordinate the event, and we were more than glad to have the opportunity to collaborate in hosting such an insightful talk.

The talk was scheduled for after lunch, but beforehand, the UMass Transportation Center treated Professor Bhat to a tasty meal at the cozy Commonwealth Restaurant here at UMass, accompanied by professors and students from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Professor Nagurney of the Isenberg School of Management.

Professor Bhat had previously been a faculty member at UMass before moving to UT Austin. This visit was nostalgic for him and all his old friends and colleagues at UMass. Professor Nagurney shared fond memories of Professor Bhat’s days here at UMass. Noteworthy is that right before kindly making the long journey to Amherst, Professor Bhat was at Chile attending a conference.

Professor Bhat’s lecture was titled “A Study on Telemedicine Adoption, with Implications for Healthcare, Telecommunications, and Land Use Transportation Planning.” Throughout the talk, he discussed multiple research projects conducted by himself and his PhD students, emphasizing the interdisciplinary approach necessary for transportation research today. The lecture focused on telemedicine adoption in the post-COVID era and provided insights for various sectors.

After the lecture, attendees enjoyed delicious food provided by UMass Catering while chatting with Professor Bhat and other faculty and students present at the event. Professor Nagurney captured a beautiful photo of three of our officers, Dana, Ismael, and Samira, with Professor Bhat and Professor Knodler.

Sadly, this was the last seminar coordinated by UMass INFORMS for the spring semester. However, we look forward to hosting an end-of-semester party with plenty of food and great company, and we are excited to return with many more exciting events next fall.

As always, please keep checking our blog posts and follow our social media accounts to stay updated on our upcoming events.

On March 15th, 2024, the UMass INFORMS Student Chapter had the honor of hosting Dr. Ayse Selin Kocaman, an Associate Professor in the Industrial Engineering Department at Bilkent University and a visiting scholar at the MIT Energy Initiative. Dr. Kocaman delivered an engaging presentation titled “Optimization-Based Solutions for the Design and Operations of Sustainable Electric Power Systems.”

Our president, Dana Hassani, gave a brief introduction highlighting Prof. Kocaman’s achievements. Prof. Kocaman has notably received the Distinguished Young Scientist (BAGEP) Award from the Science Academy of Turkey, the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) Career Award, and the Production and Operations Management Society (POMS) College of Sustainable Operations Ph.D. Proposal Award.

Our faculty advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney, also welcomed Dr. Kocaman and expressed gratitude for her acceptance of our invitation as the guest speaker. Coincidentally, Professor Nagurney was scheduled to speak at MIT shortly after and had a pleasant conversation with Dr. Kocaman about their shared acquaintances at MIT.

During her presentation, Dr. Kocaman provided an overview of her research projects, which focus on economically efficient and environmentally sustainable energy systems. Her work includes developing optimization-based solutions for the energy poverty problem.

Dr. Kocaman discussed the primary energy consumption sources and sectors in the US and their interconnections, highlighting the shift from centralized to decentralized power systems, such as grid-connected wind farms, hydro power plants, solar PV power plants, flow control, and wind farms with storage. Dr. Kocaman showcased two-stage stochastic programs for making sizing and design decisions for hybrid energy systems.

Dr. Kocaman went on to present her impactful work on energy infrastructure costs and power distribution systems in Sub-Saharan Africa. She highlighted planar facility location-allocation problems for rural electrification and spatial planning of decentralized systems.

After the presentation, we hosted Dr. Kocaman for lunch at the Commonwealth Restaurant at UMass Amherst. The food was delightful, but what truly made the occasion most memorable, as always, was the company.

We would like to express our gratitude to Dr. Kocaman for graciously accepting our invitation and delivering an insightful talk. We also extend our thanks to all ISOM and MIE faculty, to all chapter members, and Professor Nagurney for her support of this event.

As always, please stay tuned for our exciting events here at UMass Amherst, whether it’s during this spring semester or for future events.

Coinciding with the second anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the UMass INFORMS Student Chapter had the honor of hosting Dr. Ina Ganguli, an esteemed Professor of Economics in the departments of Economics and Management at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, as a guest speaker on February 23rd. Dr. Ganguli delivered a compelling presentation titled “Scientists in the Crosshairs: Impacts of War, Crisis, and Conflict on Ukrainian Science.”

Our president, Dana Hassani, introduced Dr. Ganguli and enumerated a few of her many achievements and prestigious positions, such as Director of the UMass Computational Social Science Institute (CSSI), Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), Research Fellow at the Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), Affiliated Researcher at the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics (SITE), Faculty Associate at the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies and the Laboratory for Innovation Science (LISH) at Harvard University, Fulbright scholar in Ukraine in 2004, and U.S. Embassy Policy Specialist Fellow in Russia, Azerbaijan, and Tajikistan.

Our faculty advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney, also took a minute to remind everyone of the second anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, compliment Professor Ganguli on her many academic contributions, and appreciate her for accepting our invitation as a guest speaker.

During her presentation, Professor Ganguli emphasized specific channels, such as the loss of human and physical capital due to the ongoing war, as well as disruptions to international collaborations, through which Ukrainian science and scholars have been adversely affected. Furthermore, she underscored the contrasting impacts observed in war-affected regions such as Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine compared to Crimea, which was forcefully annexed by Russia in 2014. She noted that the disruptions to Ukrainian science did not solely emerge in 2022 but rather originated during the post-Soviet era, with further exacerbation occurring during the 2014 conflict in the Donbas region and the annexation of Crimea. Moreover, she highlighted that amidst these challenging circumstances, international collaborations have had a positive effect on scientific contributions from Ukrainian scholars and academic institutions by mitigating the decline in publications.

After the presentation, we, along with our advisor, Professor Anna Nagurney, hosted Dr. Ganguli for lunch at the Commonwealth Restaurant at UMass Amherst. The food was delightful, and the desserts were enticing; however, what made it most memorable was the excellent company. After lunch, we had the pleasure of recording an interview with Dr. Ganguli for UMass INFORMS’ YouTube Channel, which will soon be available.

Once again, we would like to express our gratitude to Dr. Ganguli for graciously accepting our invitation and delivering an insightful talk. We also extend our thanks to all faculty and members who attended this event, to our officers for all their facilitating efforts, and to Professor Nagurney for her ever-present support.

As always, please stay updated on our social media and blog posts as we continue to organize many more exciting events here at UMass Amherst throughout the Spring 2024 semester.