OPTIMIZATION AND NETWORK GAME THEORY GROUP

(Left to Right: Noah Stein, Ishai Menache, Ilan Lobel, Prof. Ozdaglar, Kostas Bimpikis, Ozan Candogan, Ali ParandehGheibi)

The research in our group spans the areas of optimization theory, with emphasis on nonlinear optimization and distributed optimization methods, game theory, network economics, and network optimization and control. The group focuses on problems that arise in the analysis and optimization of large scale dynamic multi-agent networked systems, including communication networks, transportation networks, and social and economic networks.

RESEARCH GROUP

Postdoctoral Associates:

• Ali Kakhbod
• Alex Teytelboym

Graduate Students:

• Elie Adam
• Kimon Drakopoulos
• Christina Lee
• Jenny Lee
• Yongwhan Lim
• Milashini Nambiar
• Ermin Wei

• Ozan Candogan (former Ph.D student; now Assistant Professor, Fuqua School of Business, Duke University)

• Azarakhsh Malekian (former Postdoc; now Assistant Professor, Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto)

• Mohamed Mostagir (former Postdoc; now Assistant Professor, Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan)

• Ali ParandehGheibi (former Ph.D student; now Algorithm Architect, Plexxi Inc.)

• Noah Stein (former Ph.D. student; now Research Scientist, Lyric Semiconductor)

• Alireza Tahbaz-Salehi (former Postdoc; now Assistant Professor, Decision, Risk, and Operations Division, Columbia Business School, Columbia University)

• M. Ercan Yildiz (former Postdoc; now Research Manager, Social Media and Networks Division, Accenture Labs)

• Kostas Bimpikis (former Ph.D. student; now Assistant Professor, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University)

• Paul Njoroge (former Ph.D. student; now Consultant, Liberty Mutual)

• Benjamin W.K. Hung (former S.M. student; now Instructor, Department of Mathematical Sciences, US Military Academy, West Point)

• Ishai Menache (former Postdoc; now Researcher, Microsoft Research)

• Ilan Lobel (former Ph.D. student; now Assistant Professor, Stern School of Business, NYU)

• Chris T.K. Ng (former Postdoc; now at Bell Laboratories, Alcatel-Lucent)

• Atilla Eryilmaz (former Postdoc; now Assistant Professor, Ohio State University)

• Alp Simsek (former MEng student; now Assistant Professor, MIT Economics Department)

Past Visitors:

• Frank Schweitzer (Professor, Chair of Systems Design, ETH Zurich)
• Atilla Eryilmaz (Assistant Professor, Ohio State University)
• Fabio Fagnani (Professor, Department of Mathematics, Politecnico di Torino)
• Srinivas Shakkottai (Assistant Professor, Texas A&M University)
• A. Kevin Tang (Assistant Professor, Cornell University)

CURRENT RESEARCH GRANTS

• NSF "FORCES: Foundations Of Resilient CybEr-physical Systems," joint with Profs. Sastry, Bayen, Schwartz, Song, Tomlin (Berkeley), Amin, Balakrishnan (MIT), Hiskens,Teneketzis (Michigan), Gabor, Karsai, Koutsoukos, Sztipanovits (Vanderbilt)

• ARO MURI, “Evolution of Cultural Norms and Dynamics of Socio-political Change,” joint with Profs. Jadbabaie, Kearns (Upenn), Acemoglu, Christia, Dahleh (MIT), Blume, Kleinberg (Cornell), Jackson, Leskovec (Stanford), Shamma (Gatech).

• ONR MURI, “New Paradigms for Scalable Online Decentralized Optimization,” joint with Profs. Jadbabaie, Rakhlin, Ribeiro (UPenn).

• DRAPER, “Analysis and Control of Opinion Dynamics in Social Networks,” joint with Prof. Tsitsiklis (MIT).

• NSF, "Novel Game-Theoretic Tools and Solution Concepts with Applications to Network Dynamics and Control," joint with Prof. Parrilo (MIT).

• ARO, "Game-Theoretic Models of Social Conflict," joint with Prof. Acemoglu (MIT).

• AFOSR MURI, "Distributed Learning and Information Dynamics in Networked Autonomous Systems," joint with Profs. Shamma, Balcan (Gatech), Abed, Baras, Martins (UMaryland),Young (UOxford), Dahleh, Kaelbling (MIT).

• AFOSR, "Dynamics of Beliefs, Culture, and Social Interaction," joint with Profs. Acemoglu, Dahleh (MIT), Shamma (Gatech).

PAST RESEARCH GRANTS

• NSF Career Grant, "Distributed Multiagent Control and Optimization: Where Game Theory Meets Network Optimization".

• MIT Intelligence Initiative, “When are Groups More Intelligent than Individuals?” joint with Prof. Pentland (MIT).

• NSF, "An Analytic Framework for Political and Social Change: Conflict, Beliefs and Dynamics," joint with Profs. Acemoglu, Dahleh, Shah (MIT).

• DRAPER, "Opinion Formation and Influence in Conflict Situations: The Role of Networks," joint with Profs. Barnhart and Christia (MIT).

• DARPA, "ITMANET - The FLoWS project," joint with Profs. Goldsmith, Boyd, Johari (Stanford), Effros (Caltech), Coleman, Meyn, Moulin (UIUC), Medard, Shah, Zheng (MIT).

• NSF, "Optimization and Control of Stochastic Wireless Networks," joint with Prof. Parrilo (MIT).

• AFOSR, "Control Theoretic Modeling for Uncertain Cultural Attitudes and Unknown Adversarial Intent," joint with Profs. Shamma (Gatech) and Dahleh (MIT).

• NSF, "Future Optical Network Architectures," joint with Profs. Chan and Shah (MIT).

• DARPA, "CBMANET - Control-Based Mobile Ad-hoc Networking project," joint with Prof. Medard (MIT).