Distributional robustness and inequity mitigation in disaster preparedness of humanitarian operations

We study a predisaster relief network design problem with uncertain demands. The aim is to determine the prepositioning and reallocation of relief supplies. Motivated by the call of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) to leave no one behind, we consider three important practical aspects of humanitarian operations: shortages, equity, … Read more

Distributionally Robust Modeling of Optimal Control

The aim of this paper is to formulate several questions related to distributionally robust Stochastic Optimal Control modeling. As an example, the distributionally robust counterpart of the classical inventory model is discussed in details. Finite and infinite horizon stationary settings are considered. ArticleDownload View PDF

Targeted Multiobjective Dijkstra Algorithm

In this paper, we introduce the Targeted Multiobjective Dijkstra Algorithm (T-MDA), a label setting algorithm for the One-to-One Multiobjective Shortest Path (MOSP) Problem. The T-MDA is based on the recently published Multiobjective Dijkstra Algorithm (MDA) and equips it with A*-like techniques. The resulting speedup is comparable to the speedup that the original A* algorithm achieves … Read more

Inefficiency of pure Nash equilibria in series-parallel network congestion games

We study the inefficiency of pure Nash equilibria in symmetric unweighted network congestion games defined over series-parallel networks. We introduce a quantity y(D) to upper bound the Price of Anarchy (PoA) for delay functions in class D. When D is the class of polynomial functions with highest degree p, our upper bound is 2^{p+1} − … Read more

Optimisation of Step-free access Infrastructure in London Underground considering Borough Economic Inequality

Public transport is the enabler of social and economic development, as it allows the movement of people and provides access to opportunities that otherwise might have been unattainable. Access to public transport is a key aspect of social equity, with step-free access improving the inclusivity of the transport network in particular for mobility impaired population … Read more

ADMM-based Unit and Time Decomposition for Price Arbitrage by Cooperative Price-Maker Electricity Storage Units

Decarbonization via the integration of renewables poses significant challenges for electric power systems, but also creates new market opportunities. Electric energy storage can take advantage of these opportunities while providing flexibility to power systems that can help address these challenges. We propose a solution method for the optimal control of multiple price-maker electric energy storage … Read more

Data-Driven Ranges of Near-Optimal Actions for Finite Markov Decision Processes

Markov decision process (MDP) models have been used to obtain non-stationary optimal decision rules in various applications, such as treatment planning in medical decision making. However, in practice, decision makers may prefer other strategies that are not statistically different from the optimal decision rules. To benefit from the decision makers’ expertise and provide flexibility in … Read more

Interval Scheduling with Economies of Scale

Motivated by applications in cloud computing, we study interval scheduling problems exhibiting economies of scale. An instance is given by a set of jobs, each with start time, end time, and a function representing the cost of scheduling a subset of jobs on the same machine. Specifically, we focus on the max-weight function and non-negative, … Read more

Approximate Dynamic Programming for Crowd-shipping with In-store Customers

Crowd-shipping has gained significant attention as a last-mile delivery option over the recent years. In this study, we propose a variant of dynamic crowd-shipping model with in-store customers as crowd-shippers to deliver online orders within few hours. We formulate the problem as a Markov decision process and develop an approximate dynamic programming (ADP) policy using … Read more

A quasi-Newton method with Wolfe line searches for multiobjective optimization

We propose a BFGS method with Wolfe line searches for unconstrained multiobjective optimization problems. The algorithm is well defined even for general nonconvex problems. Global convergence and R-linear convergence to a Pareto optimal point are established for strongly convex problems. In the local convergence analysis, if the objective functions are locally strongly convex with Lipschitz … Read more