Simon Dunstall

CSIRO Data61, Australia

Abstract

It has become much more common to see OR techniques being applied as part of complex scientific, industrial or commercial workflows, and in real-time and/or in-situ analytics systems. The problems we are being asked to tackle are getting more challenging and more complex, and increasingly require us to integrate with computational and automation technologies including physics-based modelling, spatio-temporal analytics, cloud computing, IoT and edge computing. This is particularly the case in environmental, agricultural, natural hazards and transportation applications. Furthermore there is a perceptible correlation between the gravity of some of the most pressing challenges of our time and what is demanded of us (as OR professionals) to understand, integrate and capitalize on what other sciences and technologies bring to the table. In this presentation I will illustrate these points by way of a series of case studies involving OR advances mainly but not exclusively centred on Australia: these case studies addressing challenges in forest fires, smart cities, energy systems and health.