Foundational Operational Research: Building Theory for Practice

New technologies, new enterprises and new regulations all create new opportunities for OR techniques to make a difference. Advances in mathematical and computational capability mean that today’s OR solution can be quicker and better than yesterday’s. Modern OR can solve problems that were previously out of reach and so drive the development of entirely new business models. Although the UK was the originator of OR, it now has too few researchers addressing the scientific challenges whose solutions would further unlock OR’s potential to contribute to our national life. The LANCS Initiative will grow this number.

People

The initiative will secure a significant enhancement of research leadership in foundational OR within the UK through:

• recruiting senior scientists of international standing and junior scientists who have the potential to be tomorrow’s leaders
• providing training (at doctoral and postdoctoral levels) to develop a new generation of outstanding OR scientists.

The initiative will establish a major national hub of leading edge research activity centred on the OR groups of the four participating universities.

Scientific Challenges

Since the early days of OR, there have been vast improvements in both computer hardware and software. Sensor, monitoring and communications technologies are now ubiquitous, and can give OR methods much more data with which to work. Such changes create new and exciting challenges for OR. The ready availability of computing capability to meet these challenges intensifies rather than diminishes the need for mathematical innovation. It also calls for a change in mathematical focus. The development of models and design of algorithms are increasingly driven by the optimal use of computational capability. The research agenda will focus on key scientific challenges drawn from major areas of contemporary application. To achieve this, the research effort is currently organised around six clusters, each with its own scientific focus. There are three application clusters, in healthcare, transport, and green logistics. These are coupled to a group of three clusters in optimisation, heuristics and systems, which provide the underpinning theory to support the practice.

Outreach

The LANCS Initiative will develop a major programme of international and industrial outreach to support collaborations at the leading edge of international OR research, and with key industrial stakeholders. The Knowledge Transfer Network for Industrial Mathematics is supporting the LANCS Initiative in the development of a programme of industrial, scientific and public outreach to achieve maximum academic, commercial and social impact of the initiative’s research programmes. The launch event for the LANCS Initiative was held in London on 20 May 2009.

related resources:

»	LANCS Initiative
	Healthcare
	Green Logistics
	Transport
	Building the theory for the practice

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