Modeling, Simulation, and Risk Analysis of Large-Scale and Complex Supply Chains

Supply chains concerns the movement of merchandise from manufactures to hands of consumers. With increasing integration of the world's economy, the size and complexity of global supply chains are rising rapidly, and so is the reliance of our economy on these supply chains. Understanding and optimizing stochastic behaviors of these large-scale global supply chains is crucial for predicating and managing their uncertainty and risks. To attack computational challenges arising from the scale and complexity of these global supply chains, I am conducting an interdisciplinary research involving operations research and software engineering with purpose of seeking synergetic breakthroughs in supply-chain modeling, analyzing, optimization, and implementation. Specific topics I have been working on include: 1) developing an agent-based stochastic modeling framework, which models the elements of a supply chain as autonomous Markov decision processes; 2) developing a parallel simulation technology using generative software engineering methods; and 3) developing an efficient and rigorous automated formal stochastic analysis and optimization technique, which is based on probabilistic model checking techniques developed in software engineering.

Publications

  1. [TXME12] Li Tan, Shenghan Xu, Benjamin Meyer, and Brock Erwin: "An Extensible Object-Oriented and Agent-Based Framework for Modeling and Simulating Supply Chains." in International Journal of Information and Decision Sciences. Vol. 4, Nos 2/3, pp. 251-267. InderScience. 2012.
  2. [TanXu12] Li Tan and Shenghan Xu: "An algorithmic analysis of impact of order Splitting on safety stock". In Proceedings of the 2012 annual meeting of annual meeting of Production and Operation Management Society. Chicago, IL. April, 2012.
  3. [TanXu11] Li Tan and Shenghan Xu: "An Automated Verification Based Approach for Analyzing Safety Stock in Probabilistic Supply Chains". In Proceedings of the 2011 annual meeting of Production and Operation Management Society. Reno, NV. April, 2011.
  4. [TanXu10] Li Tan and Shenghan Xu: "A Formal Stochastic Analysis Approach for Order Splitting Policy". In Proceedings of the 2010 annual meeting of Production and Operation Management Society. Vancouver, Canada. May, 2010.
  5. [TanXu09b] Li Tan and Shenghan Xu: "Modeling and Analysis of the Impact of Demand Seasonality on Post-merger Synergy". In Proceedings of INFORMS annual conference (INFORMS'09). San Diego, CA. October, 2009.
  6. [TXME09] Li Tan, Shenghan Xu, Benjamin Meyer, and Brock Erwin: "An Agent-Based Formal Framework for Modeling and Simulating Supply Chains". In Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Information Reuse and Integration (IRI'09). Las Vegas, NV. August, 2009.
  7. [TanXu09] Li Tan and Shenghan Xu: "A Model-Checking-Based Approach to Risk Analysis in Supply Chain Consolidations". Integrated Computer-Aided Engineering. 16(3):243-257. August, 2009.
  8. [XuTan08] Shenghan Xu and Li Tan: "Formal Analysis of Risks in Stochastic Supply Chains". In the proceedings of INFORMS annual conference (INFORMS'08). Washington, DC, 2008.
  9. [TanXu08] Li Tan and Shenghan Xu: "Model Check Stochastic Supply Chains". In the proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Information Reuse and Integration (IRI'08). Las Vegas, NV, 2008.