The KTN supports postgraduate research collaborations through CASE awards allocated by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

Each CASE is awarded to a collaborative partnership between a company and a university research group and supports a PhD student to work on a mathematical project of industrial importance. The student is based at the university while maintaining regular contact with the company, and by spending at least 3 months working at the company.

Approximately 20 active industrial CASE projects are being supported by the the Industrial Mathematics KTN and further to the four awards and one ESPRC pool it allocated in each of 2008 and 2009, four further awards will be allocated to collaborations in 2010. To explore your collaborative ideas, contact Dr Melvin Brown.

Workforce scheduling

This CASE project is being carried out by Stephen Remde, under the supervision of Professor Peter Cowling and Dr Keshav Dahal of the University of Bradford, and Dr Evgeny Selensky, a Scheduling expert at Trimble MRM Ltd. The project studies novel approaches to a complex and highly dynamic workforce scheduling problem, such as that would arise for the mobile engineering workforce of a utility company.

Following creation of a detailed model for the problem, a simulation environment was designed. A wide range of algorithmic approaches to this very difficult problem of generating useful schedules was then investigated. This included a novel Variable Fitness Function method that has the potential to enhance any existing algorithmic approach.

Better schedules increase worker productivity and result in customers getting repairs and new installations quicker than before, as well reducing travel costs and environmental impact. This project represents a significant step towards these goals.

"The KTN has been an excellent facilitator throughout this project. Interesting directions and opportunities were signposted by the KTN, but we were allowed the intellectual freedom to pursue our chosen lines of investigation. The CASE scheme has allowed us to pursue a rigorous scientific research programme, while working with Trimble MRM and the KTN has ensured that our work stayed grounded in possible applications. Of course, having an excellent PhD student has been very important to these goals." - Peter Cowling, University of Bradford