University of Bergen

University of Bergen


UNIVERSITY OF BERGEN
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences
Institutt for Informatikk

HOMEPAGE OF

Conrado Borraz Sánchez, PhD
Mathematical Programming <==> Optimering


 

Current position:

Postdoc Researcher at the Center for Sustainable Energy Analytics,

NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY, Illinois, USA.

Post Address:
Department of Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences,
McCormik School of Applied Sciences,
TECH 2145 Sheridan Rd,
C124 EV, Illinois, USA 3119
Office Phone: +1 (847) 491-7247

Previous position
PhD Graduate Student in II at UiB (Bergen, NORWAY)
Optimization Research Group

Post Address:
Institutt for informatikk, Universitetet i Bergen
Postbox 7803, 5020 Bergen, Norway

The Department of Informatics is located in the High Technology Center in Bergen, Norway. How to get to the department.


The fastest way to reach me is to write me an e-mail:
NU: c-borraz-sanchez@northwestern.edu
UiB: Conrado.Borraz-Sanchez@ii.uib.no


I hold a M. Sc. degree in Systems Engineering from Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon (Mexico). While at UANL, I worked as a Graduate Research Assistant in the Graduate Program in Systems Engineering (PISIS) in the Department of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering. I also worked as an instructor of physics, chemistry, and mathematics at Escuela Normal Superior de Chiapas and Universidad Valle del Grijalva in Mexico. Here is a link to my previous Home Page and Work Page in Nuevo Leon and Chiapas, Mexico.

From November 2007 until October 2010, I was a research fellow (PhD student) at Institutt for informatikk, Det matematisk-naturvitenskapelige fakultet, UNIVERSITETET I BERGEN, Norway. My PhD defence took place on December 16, 2010, and was successfully approved by the international evaluation committee (Dr. Richard Carter, Rice University, Houston, Tx; Prof. Yves Smeers, Universite Catholique de Lovain, Belgium; and Prof. Inge Jonassen, University of Bergen, Norway).

My graduate work aimed at tackling various research projects on the optimization of natural gas pipeline network systems, including storage and transportation problems. The main contributions from these projects were (1) the mathematical formulation of (mixed-integer) NLP models for several natural gas optimization problems, and (2) the development and implementation of solution approaches to tackle such math models, in which exact and heuristic methods played a key role.

Current position
Since February 2011, I started working as a postdoc researcher at the Center for Sustainable Energy Analytics in the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences at Northwestern University. In collaboration with Dr. Diego Klabjan (at NU), my current major tasks aim at modeling and implementing solution approaches for solving the siting problem of EV charging stations in Chicago area. Besides the required theory on MINLP and its solution techniques, concurrent applications between Java and MySQL and Cplex Concert Technology are widely used to accurately estimate real statistical data taken from the EV industry and associates.


A special note:
Since the inception of this challenging but wonderful journey that I have covered through the optimization research area, quite a while back since my MSc studies, I have been quite interested in the theoretical and practical issues concerning the solution of real-life decision making problems. In particular, I have been highly motivated by the number of challenges that arise from the network flow problems and their efficient solution approaches. In addition, I have been specially intrigued by the influence that such effective exploitation of the network structures would have on developing efficient approximation algorithms.

My solution approaches focus mainly on metaheuristics (Discretized Ladder, Tabu Search, GRASP, Ant Colonies, etc.) as well as exact and approximation methods, such as Tree Decomposition, Dynamic Programming, Benders Decomposition and Branch&Bound techniques, which are applied to solve NP-difficult optimization problems (combinatorial and nonlinear).



Optimization Research Group and Research Activities

RAMONA PROJECT - Regularity and uncertainty analysis and management for the Norwegian gas processing and transportation system

PEOPLE at U of Bergen: Fac. Math and Nat. Sci: Dep. of Informatics:


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Last modified November 12, 2007

This map has really been useful for me during my first days here in Bergen, Norway
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