For decision-making in areas such as logistics and finance
Defining methodologies to optimize decision-making in situations such as the design of sustainable routes, the efficient organization of operations in a factory, the creation of low-risk share portfolios subject to minimum profit or the alignment of DNA sequences: a UOC study proposes combining computing and statistics for this type of decision-making.
The situations described are what are technically known as complex combinatorial optimization problems. A UOC doctoral thesis, by Laura Calvet, concludes that statistics could be useful as a cross-disciplinary area, which consists of the collation, analysis, interpretation and representation of data. “Normally,” Calvet states, “metaheuristics – as this type of computing is called – are fed by statistics only to understand the details of real applications and so describe or model the related problems realistically, or to describe the characteristics of the proposed solutions, routes for example.”
Calvet has analysed the works that combined statistics and metaheuristics, proposing new methodologies to refine their effectiveness. She has worked on different applications in logistics, finance and computing in which there were variable questions, such as journey time on routes. “Statistics can be integrated into metaheuristics in many ways to increase their efficiency, with integration being very useful for applications that present questions that can vary, in other words the majority of them.”
Under the title From Metaheuristics to Learnheuristics: Applications to Logistics, Finance, and Computing, the researcher defended her doctoral thesis on 12 July at the UOC, under the supervision of Àngel A. Juan, professor in the UOC's Faculty of Computer Science, Multimedia and Telecommunications and researcher with the IN3; David Masip, also professor in the Faculty of Computer Science, Multimedia and Telecommunications and director of the Doctoral School; and Carles Serrat, professor at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), receiving the highest mark: cum laude. Laura Calvet is currently at the University of Portsmouth, in the United Kingdom, to continue researching into the use of methodologies in the fields of logistics and finance.