SMARTS Research Shines at INFORMS Annual Meeting 2025 in Atlanta

Researchers from SMARTS made a strong showing at the INFORMS Annual Meeting 2025, presenting two cutting-edge studies during a technical session “Innovative Approach to Efficient Airspace Management” on Sunday, October 26.

The presentations, both delivered in the Air Transportation Section track at the Georgia World Congress Center, showcased innovative approaches to flight trajectory analysis and airspace management.

Advancing Flight Trajectory Analysis

The first presentation, “3D Optimal Airspace Sector Design with Mixed Integer Linear Programming,” was delivered by Go Nam Lui and Guglielmo Lulli from Lancaster University. The talk explored mathematical optimization techniques for designing airspace sectors in three dimensions.

Immediately following, the team presented “Functional Data Analysis in Flight Trajectory Clustering” from 3:03 PM to 3:21 PM in the same venue. This research, conducted by an international collaboration including researchers from Lancaster University Management School, Nanyang Technological University, and the University of Milano-Bicocca, introduces novel statistical methods for analyzing and clustering flight trajectories.

Significance for Aviation

Both presentations address critical challenges in air traffic management. The functional data analysis approach offers new tools for understanding flight patterns, while the airspace sector design work provides optimization frameworks that could enhance efficiency and safety in increasingly crowded skies.

The INFORMS Annual Meeting brings together operations research and analytics professionals from around the world to share the latest advances in the field. This year’s conference in Atlanta featured hundreds of technical sessions across diverse application areas.

The successful presentations underscore SMARTS’ growing reputation in aviation research and its commitment to developing practical solutions for complex air transportation challenges.