IFIP Technical Committee 7: System Modeling and Optimization. A Historical Note

Technical Committee 7 of IFIP was created first to establish a bridge between group of mathematicians and engineers working in modeling and optimization in the east and west countries. With changing world it became an important scientific group stimulating research in modeling and optimization. This note is trying to summarize activities of the Technical Committee over the last 50 (and more) years. 1. Early years of TC7 and TC7 in present time The idea to create TC7 appeared for the first time during IFIP meeting in 1967 in Rome, where A.V. Balakrishnan, J. L. Lions and M. Marchuk were thinking about forming a research coalition devoted to Modeling and Optimization. Officially IFIP TC7 was founded in 1972 by A.V. Balakrishnan, J. L. Lions and M. Marchuk. The aims of this Technical Committee were formulated as follows (and there are still actual): • To provide an international clearing house for computational as well as related theoretical aspects of optimization problems in diverse areas and to share computing experience gained on specific applications, • To promote the development of necessary high-level theory to meet the needs of complex optimization problems and establish cooperation with the international Mathematical Union and similar organizations, • To foster interdisciplinary activity on optimization problems spanning the various areas such as Economics (including Business Administration and Management), Biomedicine, Meteorology etc., in cooperation with associated international bodies. Generally at that time it was important to create a research bridge between West and East. IFIP TC7 for a long time played this role. Geopolitical changes in Europe improved channels of scientific cooperation and stimulated further development of TC7. All members of TC7, in particular chairmen had strong impact on its activities. The list of chairmen of IFIP TC7 looks as follows: A.V. Balakrishnan, Los Angeles, US 1972-1979 J. Stoer, Würzburg, D 1979-1985 M. Lucertini, Rome, I 1985-1988 P. Thoft-Christensen, Aalborg, DK 1988-1995 P. Kall, Zurich, S 1995-2001 I. Lasiecka, Charlottesville, US 2001-2008 J. Henry, Bordeaux, F 2008-2012 F. Tröltzsch, Berlin, D 2013-2018 Ł. Stettner, Warsaw, PL 2018Current list of members of TC7 consists of the chair: Prof. Dr. Lukasz STETTNER, PL, Polish Academy of Sciences, Institute of Mathematics and two vice chairs: Prof. Dr. Dietmar HÖMBERG, DE, WIAS Weierstraß-Institut and Prof. Irena LASIECKA, ACM, The University of Memphis, Department of Mathematical Sciences as well as (where with * we denote honorary members while with ** the members recommended by TC7): Barbara Kaltenbacher AT, Philippe Toint BE, Edmundo de Souza e Silva BR, Hector Cancela CLEI, Jiri Outrata CZ, Josef Stoer* DE, Arnd Rösch** DE, Fredi Tröltzsch* DE, lain Larsen DK, Josep Casanovas ES, Luis Alberto Fernández** ES, Grégoire Allaire FR, Stefan Scholtes GB, Istvan Maros HU, Maria C. Calzarossa IT, Hisao Kameda JP, Junho Song KR, Adrie J.M. Beulens NL, Jose Antonio Oliveira PT, Vyacheslav Maksimov RU, Lidija Zadnik Stirn SI. 2. Scope of the activities of TC7 and working groups Generally speaking the scope of TC7 is two-fold: to foster the theoretical foundation for problems of the TC's concern and, based thereon, to develop or improve corresponding solution methods and their implementations. This broad scope of the TC7 is studied by a number of Working Groups which are involved both in the progress of theoretical research and in the growth of practical needs. The scope of TC7 consists in computational aspects of optimization problems arising in such areas as Aerospace, Biomedicine, Economics, Meteorology, and Public Services (Health, Environment, Police, Fire, Transportation, etc.). Some specific examples are: • on-line and off-line computational techniques in modeling and control of dynamic systems; • trajectory analysis and computation; • optimization of decentralized systems (macro-economic systems) and systems with multicriteria; • optimization of resource allocation in urban systems; • optimization of pollution-control systems; • optimization of man-machine systems; • optimization of power systems operation; • risk management in particular in mathematical finance and insurance; • development of machine learning techniques, • optimization and control under uncertainty. There are 8 Working Groups being active within TC7, which we list below (in brackets we write year of foundation and the name of the first chair at foundation) with named chairs of them: WG7.1 Modeling and Simulation (1972, W.A. Karplus, USA), temporarily suspended since 2018 WG7.2 Computational Techniques in Distributed Systems (1973, J.L. Lions, F), Chaired by Dietmar Hömberg WG7.3 Computer System Modeling (1973, P.E. Green, USA), Chaired by Mark S. Squillante WG7.4 Discrete Optimization (1983, M. Padberg, USA), changed in 2014 to Inverse Problems and Imaging, Chaired by Christian Clason WG7.5 Reliability and Optimization of Structural Systems (1986, P. ThoftChristensen, DK), Chaired by Junho Song WG7.6 Optimization-Based Computer-Aided Modeling and Design (1989, H.-J. Sebastian, D), Revised in 1999, Chaired by Janusz Granat WG7.7 Stochastic Optimization (1989, P. Kall, CH), changed in 2018 to Stochastic Control and Optimization, Chaired by Jan Palczewski WG7.8 Nonlinear Optimization, (2018, Radu Ioan Bot) Working groups used to organize workshops and seminars. Periodically they publish proceedings of their activities. We present below a list of proceedings of such workshops: Modelling and Optimization of Complex System, Proceedings of the IFIP-TC 7 Working Conference Novosibirsk, USSR, 3–9 July, 1978, Ed. Guri Ivanovich Marchuk, Global Modelling, Proceedings of the IFIP-WG 7/1 Working Conference Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia, Sept. 1–5, 1980, Ed. Slobodan Krčevinac, Advances in Filtering and Optimal Stochastic Control, Proceedings of the IFIP-WG 7/1 Working Conference Cocoyoc, Mexico, February 1–6, 1982, Ed. Wendell H. Fleming, Luis G. Gorostiza, Recent Advances in System Modelling and Optimization, Proceedings of the IFIP-WG 7/1 Working Conference Santiago, Chile, August 27–31, 1984, Ed. Luis Contesse B., Rafael Correa F., Andrés Weintraub P., Stochastic Modelling and Filtering, Proceedings of the IFIP-WG 7/1 Working Conference Rome, Italy, December 10–14, 1984, Ed. Alfredo Germani, Control Problems for Systems Described by Partial Differential Equations and Applications, Proceedings of the IFIP-WG 7.2 Working Conference Gainesville, Florida, February 3–6, 1986, Ed. Irena Lasiecka, Roberto Triggiani, Stochastic Differential Systems, Proceedings of the IFIP-WG 7/1 Working Conference Eisenach, GDR, April 6–13, 1986,Ed. Hans Jürgen Engelbert, Wolfgang Schmidt, Reliability and Optimization of Structural Systems, Proceedings of the First IFIP WG 7.5 Working Conference Aalborg, Denmark, May 6–8, 1987, Ed. P. Thoft-Christensen, Boundary Control and Boundary Variations, Proceedings of the IFIP WG 7.2 Conference Nice, France, June 10–13, 1987, Ed. J. P. Zolésio, Control of Partial Differential Equations, Proceedings of the IFIP WG 7.2 Working Conference Santiago de Compostela, Spain, July 6–9, 1987, Ed. Alfredo Bermúdez, Control of Boundaries and Stabilization, Proceedings of the IFIP WG 7.2 Conference Clermont Ferrand, France, June 20–23, 1988, Ed. Jacques Simon, Stochastic Systems and Optimization, Proceedings of the 6th IFIP WG 7.1 Working Conference Warsaw, Poland, September 12–16, 1988, Ed. Jerzy Zabczyk, Reliability and Optimization of Structural Systems ’88, Proceedings of the 2nd IFIP WG7.5 Conference London, UK, September 26–28, 1988, Ed. P. Thoft-Christensen, Modelling and Inverse Problems of Control for Distributed Parameter Systems, Proceedings of IFIP (W.G.7.2)-IIASA Conference, Laxenburg, Austria, July 24–28, 1989, Ed. Alexander Kurzhanski, Irena Lasiecka, Reliability and Optimization of Structural Systems ’90, Proceedings of the 3rd IFIP WG 7.5 Conference Berkeley, California, USA, March 26–28, 1990, Ed. A. Der Kiureghian, P. ThoftChristensen, Optimal Control of Partial Differential Equations, Proceedings of the IFIP WG 7.2 International Conference Irsee, April 9–12, 1990, Ed. Karl-Heinz Hoffmann, Werner Krabs, Control Theory of Distributed Parameter Systems and Applications, Proceedings of the IFIP WG 7.2 Working Conference Shanghai, China, May 6–9, 1990, Ed. Xunjing Li, Jiongmin Yong, Boundary Control and Boundary Variation,Proceedings of IFIP WG 7.2 Conference Sophia Antipolis, France, October 15 – 17, 1990, Ed. Jean Paul Zolésio, Stochastic Partial Differential Equations and Their Applications, Proceedings of IFIP WG 7/1 International Conference University of North Carolina at Charlotte, NC June 6–8, 1991, Ed. Boris L. Rozovskii, Richard B. Sowers, Reliability and Optimization of Structural Systems ’91, Proceedings of the 4th IFIP WG 7.5 Conference Munich, Germany, September 11–13, 1991, Ed. Rüdiger Rackwitz, Palle ThoftChristensen, Optimization-Based Computer-Aided Modelling and Design, Proceedings of the First Working Conference of the IFIP TC 7.6 Working Group The Hague, The Netherlands, 1991, Ed. Adriaan Jacobus Maria Beulens, Hans-Jürgen Sebastian. 3. General Conferences One of the main activities of TC7 are general conferences, which in fact started before creation of TC7. The conferences had different names but starting from 1981 it was fixed to System Modeling and Optimization. TC7 general conferences played an important role in research activities. They gathered usually a number of leading specialists. Plenary lectures were delivered by mathematicians and engineers working in theoretical and practical aspects of various applications. We list below general IFIP conferences, mainly the list of their proceedings (with few exceptions), which usually (starting from 7th Conference) are organized every two years. Colloquium on Methods of Optimization, Novosibirsk, June 1968, Computing Methods in Optimization Problems, San Remo, September 19