INFORMS Releases

CATONSVILLE, MD, December 12, 2017 – With revenue from college football at an unprecedented $3.4 billion annually, universities across the country invest tens of millions each year in recruitment efforts to attract high school athletes to play for their football teams. But with talented players typically receiving scholarship offers from multiple universities, team rosters are in limbo until student athletes commit to a university. However, a new study in the INFORMS journal Decision Analysis shares how social media can provide universities with valuable insight into the decision-making process of their recruits.

CATONSVILLE, MD, December 4, 2017 – The term ‘tortured artists’ has been used to describe some of history’s greatest painters, from Vincent Van Gogh and Henri de Tolousse-Lautrec to Pablo Picasso and Jackson Pollock. They are credited with creating some of the world’s most recognized works of art despite lives that were often characterized by great emotional unrest and personal unhappiness. But does misery really beget valuable works of art?  According to a new study in the INFORMS journal Management Science, personal unhappiness, particularly that experienced in times of mourning or bereavement, can actually cause a significant decrease in the value of an artist’s work. 

CATONSVILLE, MD, November 13, 2017 – “Mobile money,” a checking account attached to a mobile phone number, has revolutionized the financial lives of millions of people in many developing countries without access to a banking infrastructure. Using text messages or apps on consumer phones and in partnership with mom-and-pop retailers, who serve as cash-in and cash-out points, telecom companies have created an accessible and cost-effective virtual banking infrastructure in many developing countries. 

CATONSVILLE, MD, October 30, 2017 – From reporting traffic jams using the Waze app to a colony of ants working together to achieve extraordinary feats, examples of crowdsourcing and collective intelligence are all around us. As the problems that we face grow in complexity, the speed and reach of communications and data flow are vastly improving now that just about anyone can act as a consultant on a problem by providing their own individual expertise and information. Analytics can be used to refine this insight from groups to improve solutions to problems in a variety of areas including economics, computer science, biology, communications, political science, and organizational behavior. 

Nearly 100 unique factors have to be considered during the complicated task of assigning inmates to any of the Pennsylvania Department of Correction’s 25 facilities.  What once took seven employees nearly a week to accomplish can now be completed in less than 10 minutes at an expected savings of nearly $3 million, thanks to an algorithm created by a team of Lehigh University students and professors, and the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. In recognition of their unique new application of operations research (O.R.), Tamás Terlaky, Mohammad Shahabsafa, Chaitanya Gudapati, Anshul Sharma, Louis J. Plebani, and George R. Wilson, Lehigh University; and Kristofer B. Bucklen, Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, were presented the Daniel H. Wagner Prize for Excellence in Operations Research Practice by INFORMS, the leading international association for analytics and operations research professionals.