Georgia Tech SCL Georgia Tech SCL Georgia Tech SCL

Scheduling is big business. In fact, producing a balanced schedule is more than a matter of simply running the numbers. Whether you are scheduling personnel, aircraft fleets, ocean containers, or even Major League Baseball games, creating a balanced schedule is extremely complex because of the vast number of factors that must be taken into account. As financial and competitive stakes in industry continue to rise, so does the complexity of scheduling. 

Work involves developing models and algorithms that provide practical solutions for large-scale scheduling problems, scheduling scarce resources under complex constraints, scheduling issues including variability and uncertainty, and integrating-collaboration and optimization in the development of schedules. Applications range from scheduling machines in a factory to an airline assigning thousands of pilots to flights to major league baseball creating schedules of 162 games for each of 30 teams. All of these problems have complex constraints and many variables. The resource scheduling center employs faculty and PhD student expertise to develop models and algorithms to solve such problems. Specific research projects include:

• Per-Seat On-Demand Air Transportation - development of an efficient control system for aircraft to service individual on-demand customers with personal scheduling.
• Sports Scheduling - developing schedules for sports including ACC Basketball and Major League Baseball.
• Routing and scheduling of oil tankers to get the right products in the right place at the right time.
• Production Sequencing and Scheduling—development of algorithms to minimize scrap loss while effectively utilizing material handling resources, including robotic packing, in continuous production environments such as plate glass manufacturing. Creating effective scheduling systems is an extremely important factor in reducing costs, improving safety, and increasing efficiency in a variety of industries.