Luka Stärk and his team mate Carolin Scholl won the DISPLIB 2025 Competition for real-time train dispatching. Their custom branch-and-bound algorithm solved the difficult scheduling problems, many of them even to proven optimality. The innovative method has a parameterized complexity of O(4^k poly(n)), where k is the number of conflicts and n is the number...Read More
Enrico Bortoletto successfully defended his dissertation “Geometric Advances and Infrastructure Awareness in Periodic Timetabling” at the Institute of Mathematics at Freie Universität Berlin on July 14, 2025. He introduced two novel geometric perspectives on the periodic event scheduling problem, that was hitherto studied in terms of periodic tensions. In the periodic timetabling space, the set...Read More
Recently, Google DeepMind made waves with a blog post about AlphaEvolve, a new LLM-based tool that writes its own algorithms to crack notoriously difficult math problems. Just weeks after Google published new best-known solutions for 13 previously unsolved problems using AlphaEvolve, a team from the MODAL research campus developed formulations that were solved with FICO...Read More
Gioni Mexi, Deborah Hendrych, Sébastien Designolle, Mathieu Besançon, and Sebastian Pokutta were awarded the Land-Doig Competition Prize 2025 at the Mixed-Integer Programming Workshop 2025 for the best contribution to the heuristic solution of Mixed-Integer Quadratic Optimization Problems (MIQP and MIQCQP). The competition focused on the development of innovative primal heuristics that can quickly generate high-quality...Read More
The MODAL-Forschungscampus proudly announces the successful extension of the MATH+ Cluster of Excellence, which will receive continued funding for another seven years under the Excellence Strategy of the German federal and state governments. This renewed support recognizes the world-class research achievements of the cluster and affirms Berlin’s standing as a global hub for applications-driven mathematical...Read More
In preparation for the third phase of the BMBF research campus MODAL, our new industrial partner Stryker Berlin GmbH visited ZIB together with their Freiburg colleagues from Stryker Leibinger GmbH & Co KG, Patient Specific Solutions. The visitors were given an overview of ZIB research in the field of medicine and life sciences in the...Read More
On 28-30 April 2026, the “18th Annual Meeting Photonic Devices” will take place at Zuse Institute Berlin. The AMPD 2026 workshop will focus on photonic devices, with an emphasis on numerical methods and on nanophotonics from fundamental research to applications. The aim is an active exchange of ideas, methods, and results between dynamic science and...Read More
During the 11th International Conference on Railway Operations Modelling and Analysis (RailDresden 2025), Dr. Niels Lindner from the MODAL MobilityLab at Zuse Institute Berlin has been elected as a new board member of the International Association of Railway Operations Research (IAROR). IAROR (https://www.iaror.org) is a network of excellence in the field of railway operations research...Read More
ZIB opened its doors again on April 3, 2025 for the annual Girls’Day. In cooperation with the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at Freie Universität Berlin, we were able to offer more than 200 places for schoolgirls. The offer was very well received with 187 participants, 61 of whom took part in the workshops...Read More
Launch of Application Process for the MODAL/GRIPS Summer Internship Program The Zuse Institute Berlin (ZIB), together with the Institute for Pure & Applied Mathematics (IPAM) at UCLA, is thrilled to announce that the application process for the Graduate-Level Research in Industrial Projects for Students (GRIPS) is now open. This prestigious internship, aimed at master’s and...Read More
