Research Interests

• Solving algorithmic problems arising in various application domains, e.g. network design and other problems on graphs, transportation optimization, cutting and packing, computational biology, scheduling and timetabling
• Combinatorial optimization by means of exact techniques including mathematical programming, branch and bound, dynamic programming, constraint programming as well as heuristics and metaheuristics
• Machine learning, reinforcement learning
• A particular focus lies in hybrid optimization techniques combining concepts of (meta-)heuristics, exact optimization techniques, and machine learning.
• Efficient algorithms and data structures in general.

Also see the group’s research page.

International Organizational Activities

Board Memberships etc.:

• Faculty member of the Vienna Graduate School on Computational Optimization (VGSCO), since 2017.
• Editorial board member of the Algorithms journal , MDPI, since 2020.
• Editorial board member of the journal Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence, Elsevier, since 2022.
• Associate editor for ACM Transactions on Evolutionary Learning and Optimization, since 2019.
• Associate editor of the INFORMS Journal on Computing, since 2013.
• Editorial board member of the Metaheuristics journal, Springer, since 2018.
• Associate editor of the Evolutionary Computation Journal, MIT Press, 2005-2014, editorial board member since 2015.
• Associate editor of the International Journal of Metaheuristics, Inderscience, since 2007.
• Editorial board member of the journal Journal of Artificial Evolution and Applications, Hindawi Publishing, 2007-2010.
• Editorial board member of the journal Memetic Computing, Springer, since 2007.
• Editorial board member of the International Journal of Applied Metaheuristic Computing, IGI Global, since 2010
• Co-founder and member of the steering committee of the Conference Series on Evolutionary Computation in Combinatorial Optimization, EvoCOP.
• Steering committee member of EvoAPPS, the Int. Conference Series on Applications of Evolutionary Computation, since 2018.
• We have participated in the European Marie Curie Research Training Network on Algorithmic and Discrete Optimization (ADONET) and I was TU Wien’s local coordinator.
• Executive Board member of ÖGOR, the Austrian Society of Operations Research, 2013-2016.
• Management Board member of EU COST Action CA15140 Improving Applicability of Nature-Inspired Optimisation by Joining Theory and Practice (ImAppNIO) since January 2016

Some (more or less) recent major activities:

• Co-Chair of the Workshop on Theory and Applications of Metaheuristic Algorithms at the 19th International Conference on Computer Aided Systems Theory, Gran Canaria, Spain, February 2024.

• Local chair of SoCS 2022: The International Symposium on Combinatorial Search, Vienna, Austria, July 2022.

• Program Chair of the 10th Metaheuristic International Conference (MIC) 2013, Singapore, August 2013.

• Local Co-Organizer of EvoStar 2013, The Leading European Event on Bioinspired Computation, Vienna, Austria, April 2013.

• General and Local Chair of the Hybrid Metaheuristics Workshop, Vienna, Austria, October 1-2, 2010.

• Co-Chair of the Evolutionary & Metaheuristic Combinatorial Optimization Track of the 2011 Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO), Dublin, Ireland, July 2011.

• Editor-in-Chief and Program Chair of GECCO 2009, the 11th Annual Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference 2009, ACM, Montreal, Canada, July 2009.

• IEEE Computational Intelligence Society Emergent Technology Technical Committee Member (IEEE CIS ETTC), 2012.

• EvoStar “Old Croc” Award for Outstanding Contributions to Evolutionary Computation in Europe, April 2012

Finally, find here a detailed list of most of my past and present international organisational activities.