The CORS Queueing and Applied Probability (QAP) Special Interest Group will be hosting a micro-event on Thursday, February 6, 2025, from 4:00 to 5:00 PM EST. This online seminar will feature Professor Peter Taylor from The University of Melbourne.

We warmly invite you to join us by registering at the following link:

Register Here

Event Details

• Date and Time: February 6, 2025, 4:00–5:00 PM EST
• Cost: Free
• Event Link: A Google Meet link will be sent to registered participants a few days before the event.
• Speaker: Professor Peter Taylor, The University of Melbourne

Seminar Details

Title: The Role of Physical Understanding in Matrix-Analytic Methods

Abstract

Since Marcel Neuts first showed that Markov chains of GI/M/1 type have a matrix-geometric stationary distribution in the 1970s and 1980s, the interplay between analytic properties and physical interpretation has played a major part in the development of matrix-analytic methods for stochastic models. Most performance measures of interest in such models can be expressed in terms of the solutions of equations involving matrix power series, which have to be solved numerically.

Over the years, various iterative algorithms have been proposed for doing this. In order to establish convergence and gain information about the speed of convergence, it is often helpful to think about the physical interpretation of the iterates. I shall discuss the physical interpretation of matrix-analytic algorithms that have been proposed for analysing block-structured Markov additive models.

Speaker Bio

Professor Peter Taylor is the Director of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Mathematical and Statistical Frontiers and Chief Investigator at The University of Melbourne. His research interests lie in the fields of stochastic modelling and applied probability. Recently, he has become interested in the interaction of stochastic modelling with optimisation and optimal control under conditions of uncertainty.

He is regularly invited to present plenary papers at international conferences and has served on organising and program committees for many conferences. Professor Taylor is the editor-in-chief of the Applied Probability Trust journals Journal of Applied Probability and Advances in Applied Probability, and previously served as Editor-in-Chief of Stochastic Models from 2002 to 2018. He is also a member of the editorial board of Queueing Systems. He has served on the Awards Committee of the Applied Probability Section of INFORMS and was Co-Chair of the Nicholson Prize Committee in 2016.

We look forward to your participation!

Best Regards,

Amir Rastpour (he/him), Ph.D.
President, CORS Queueing and Applied Probability (QAP) Special Interest Group
Associate Professor of Operations Management
Faculty of Business and Information Technology
Ontario Tech University