STOCHASTIC NETWORKS CONFERENCE
UC San Diego, June 20-24, 2016


Stochastic Networks Conference Group Photo taken by Kenji Bennett, Qualcomm Institute, UC San Diego

The twelfth international Conference on Stochastic Networks was held June 20-24, 2016, at the University of California, San Diego.


BACKGROUND
This week-long event continues a tradition that was started in 1987 and has now become a biennial event. The aim of the conference is to bring together researchers who share an interest in stochastic network models, to survey recent developments, and to identify future research directions. As in the past, the 2016 meeting will be structured in a workshop format, with approximately twenty hour-long invited talks, allowing ample unscheduled time to maximize interactions between speakers and participants and to facilitate a fruitful exchange of ideas. In addition, there will be a poster session for contributed papers.

Stochastic networks is a multifaceted area of research dealing with the modeling, stability, control, performance, approximation, and design of stochastic networks. It gives rise to challenging and subtle mathematical problems, whose solution often requires a combination of ideas and techniques from several branches of mathematics, including probability theory, stochastic processes, analysis, optimization, algorithms, combinatorics, and graph theory. Research in this area is strongly motivated by applications in diverse domains, ranging from the traditional areas of telecommunications and manufacturing to service operations, biological and social networks, revenue management, and health care.

Like its predecessors, the 2016 Stochastic Networks Conference will emphasize new model structures and new mathematical problems that are motivated by contemporary developments in various application domains, as well as new mathematical methods for stochastic network analysis.


SCIENTIFIC PROGRAM COMMITTEE
Tara Javidi, Haya Kaspi, Frank Kelly, Balaji Prabhakar, Amber Puha, R. Srikant, John Tsitsiklis, Jean Walrand, Ruth Williams (chair), Assaf Zeevi.
INVITED SPEAKERS
Emmanuel Abbe (Princeton), Rami Atar (Technion), Francois Baccelli (U. Texas, Austin), Maury Bramson (U. of Minnesota), Guy Bresler (MIT), Fan Chung Graham (UC San Diego), Jim Dai (Cornell), Itai Gurvich (Northwestern), Weining Kang (Univ. Maryland, Baltimore County), Tom Kurtz (U. Wisconsin), Mark Lewis (Cornell), Yi Lu (U. Illinois, Urbana-Champaign), Siva Maguluri (IBM T. J. Watson Research Center), Laurent Massoulie (Microsoft Research-INRIA), Angelia Nedich (U. Illinois, Urbana-Champaign), Kavita Ramanan (Brown U.), Philippe Robert (INRIA), Neil Walton (Manchester University), Galit Yom Tov (Technion) and Bert Zwart (Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica).
SCHEDULE, TITLES, ABSTACTS
The conference will run from 8.30am on Monday, June 20 until 12.15pm on Friday, June 24, 2016.
For the current conference schedule, click here. Please note that there has been a slight change in the schedule for Friday, with the cancellation of one talk.
For a version of the schedule with titles of talks, click here.
The titles and abstracts for the plenary talks are here.
The titles and abstracts for the posters (in alphabetical order) are here.
Titles and speakers for posters in presentation order are here.
SLIDES FROM TALKS
In the file available here, click on the blue links for each speaker to see if there is a file with the associated slides. Many talks will be available after the speaker has spoken, but not all talks are available.
POSTER SESSION AWARDS
For the winners of the Stochastic Networks Conference 2016 Outstanding Poster Awards, click here.
For a photo of 6 of the 7 poster prize winners, click here.
The poster award winners received book prizes. We are grateful to Cambridge University Press for donating books to be used as prizes.
VENUE AND MAPS
The conference will be held in Atkinson Hall, at Qualcomm Institute (QI). QI was formerly known as CalIT2 and is found on many maps under the latter name.
A map of the UCSD campus showing Atkinson Hall in purple is here.
A map showing walking routes from the Sheraton hotel to CalIT2 is here.
A map showing walking routes from on-campus housing to CalIT2 is here. (You will be close when you find the courtyard containing the statue of a bear.)

A map showing walking route from Qualcomm Institute (CalIT2) to Torrey Pines Glider Port is available here.
A map showing walking route from Torrey Pines Glider Port to Bella Vista Caffe is available here.
A map showing walking route from Bella Vista Caffe to on-campus housing at the Village is available here.
A map showing walking routes from Bella Vista Caffe to Sheraton hotel is available here.
A link to the website for the Bella Vista Caffe is here.


EATING NEAR UCSD
During the conference, lunch can be purchased at the nearby Price Center or at the Faculty Club (provided you are accompanied by a member). For restaurants near the Sheraton La Jolla hotel, click here. Note: BJs Restaurant and Brewhouse is closed permanently. Participants staying in on-campus accommodation may eat by paying cash at the on-campus dining facilities. The Cafe Ventana dining facility is close to the Village on-campus housing. Some other restaurants (including some expensive ones) in the UCSD vicinity are listed here.
DRIVING DIRECTIONS AND PARKING AT UCSD
If you are driving to the conference, some directions on how to find the site are here. The nearest intersection to CalIT2 is Voigt Drive and Engineer Lane, or Voigt Drive and Equality Lane. Uber, Lyft, Taxi pickup should be directed to Atkinson Hall at the intersection of Voigt Drive and Equality Lane. The entrance to Atkinson Hall is on the opposite side of the building, Atkinson Hall, from the dropoff point.
Information about on-campus parking for conference participants is available by clicking here. Permits are required to park on-campus, except that on-campus parking is free on the weekends and between 11pm and 7a.m. on weekdays, except in spots designated as 24 hr, handicapped or otherwise restricted. The nearest parking lot to the conference site is Parking Lot P502. The nearest parking structure is the Hopkins Parking Structure. You can buy 1-day or 5-day B-permits online prior to coming to the conference at the website mentioned above, after June 1, 2016. These are valid in S (yellow) and B (green) spaces. Buying a permit online in advance is recommended. Although some parking lots/structures have machines (especially the Hopkins parking structure) that issue permits, the cost for these may be higher than buying a B-permit online in advance. A searchable campus map where parking lots/structures can be found is available here. Participants who are UC faculty or staff and have annual parking permits from another University of California campus may park for free at UCSD. But see the procedure here for obtaining a permit to park at UCSD.
POSTER SESSION
The conference will include a poster session on Monday evening, June 20, 5.30-7.30 p.m. Immediately prior to the poster session, 3.30-5.30 p.m., there will be a session of poster previews, in which each poster presenter will have the opportunity to give a brief presentation of a few minutes in length, using a computer, which will serve as an advertisement for their poster. To apply to present a poster, click here, and follow the instructions. The deadline for applying to present a poster is 11pm Pacific Standard Time on February 5, 2016. The poster session is now completely full and no more posters are being accepted.
For those whose poster has been accepted, instructions on how to prepare your poster and a brief introductory talk are here.
REGISTRATION
Registration is required of all participants. Registration is open to researchers in the area of stochastic networks and their applications who are affiliated with Universities or industrial or government research institutions. This includes current postdocs and Ph.D. students.
The registration fee for regular participants is $50 per person until April 30, 2016, and after that it will be $70 per person. There is a reduced registration fee of $30 per person for graduate students. The (optional) conference banquet will be in the evening of Thursday, June 23 and will cost $33 per person. Conference registrants may bring one guest to the banquet (at a cost of an additional $33).
Registration for the conference and the banquet is available by clicking here.
The conference is not open to the general public.

ACCOMMODATION

Hotel Accommodation
A block of rooms has been reserved at the Sheraton La Jolla Hotel, 3299 Holiday Court, La Jolla, CA 92037, at a discounted rate of $169+tax per room per night for conference participants. This hotel is recommended for conference participants as it is very close to the UCSD campus and is walking distance (about 20 minutes) from the conference venue. The conference will start on Monday, June 20 and we anticipate it ending by 1pm on Friday, June 24. Reservations at the discounted rate can be made online by clicking here or by calling Toll-Free, 1-800-325-3535, and asking for the "StochNet" group rate.
The room block expires on May 20, 2016. However, participants are encouraged to make reservations as soon as their travel plans are set because San Diego is a popular summer travel location and hotel rooms are in high demand. Rooms may no longer be available once the room block is exhausted. If you are unable to make a reservation because of apparent lack of availability, please email williams at math dot ucsd dot edu as it may be possible to expand the block. In this case, please indicate the dates you tried to make a reservation for.

On-campus accommodation
A limited number of on-campus student apartments are available for participants who are not receiving travel support and who wish to rent such an apartment themselves. More information about this accommodation is available by clicking here. However, as authorization is required to reserve this accommodation, conference participants wishing to reserve this accommodation should contact williams at math dot ucsd dot edu for information on how to make a reservation. Those making inquiries should indicate that they plan to participate in the conference, their instititutional affiliation and how many persons are in their party. Those reserving this accommodation are responsible for paying for it themselves.

The check-in for the on-campus accommodation (for those who have reservations) is The Village Conference Desk, located on the UC San Diego campus at Village West, Building 3, 2202 Scholars Dr N, UCSD La Jolla CA 92093. Check-in time is after 4pm, check-out time is before 11am. A discount is available with Supershuttle for a shared ride between UCSD and the airport (in either direction). For this, use UCSD group discount code "556CV".


LOCAL CHILD CARE AND SUMMER CAMP INFORMATION
Information about local child care resources and summer camp opportunities is available by clicking here.
TRAVEL
The closest airport to UC San Diego is the San Diego International airport. It is a major airport serviced mainly by U.S. carriers. There are very few direct international flights to San Diego. If you are traveling from abroad, many U.S. carriers have connections to San Diego through cities on the East Coast, mid West or through Los Angeles International airport (LAX). It is also possible to fly to LAX and rent a car. It usually takes 2-3 hours to drive from LAX to UC San Diego, depending on traffic. From San Diego airport, one can catch a shared shuttle (about US$20 per person) or a taxi (about US$45 before tip) to UC San Diego or the Sheraton La Jolla hotel. A discount is available with Supershuttle for a shared ride between UCSD and the airport (in either direction). For this, use UCSD group discount code "556CV".
VISAS FOR U.S. ENTRY
For those participants traveling from abroad (and who are not U.S. citizens or permanent residents), information on U.S. visa requirements is available by clicking here.
QUESTIONS
Questions about the conference can be directed to williams at math dot ucsd dot edu.
PAST CONFERENCES
For more information about the series of Stochastic Networks Conferences, click here.
SPONSORS
We are grateful for the generous support of the following sponsors.

The conference is cosponsored by Qualcomm Institute (formerly CalIT2), the UC San Diego Mathematics Department, the UC San Diego Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS).


In addition to the support provided by our institutional sponsors, partial support has been provided for this conference by a grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation and by IBM Research. Further support has been provided by a gift from Dan Chung, donated in memory of Professor Kai Lai Chung, who was one of the leading probabilists of the second half of the twentieth century. Additional support has been provided by the Charles Lee Powell Foundation. We are grateful to Cambridge University Press for donating prizes for the poster award winners.



TRAVEL SUPPORT FOR SOME PARTICIPANTS
A limited amount of funding has been provided, in particular, from the U.S. National Science Foundation, to help in defraying the travel costs of early career researchers, women, and underrepresented minorities, participating in the 2016 Stochastic Networks Conference. Early career researchers are researchers who received their Ph.D. in 2011 or later, or who are Ph.D. students expecting to complete their Ph.D. by the end of 2017. For details on how to apply, click here. The application deadline is 11pm Pacific Standard Time, February 5, 2016.
Update: As of April 2016, all available funds have now been committed.
CAMPUS MAP
Click here for a campus map.
AROUND CAMPUS
The UCSD Stuart Collection is a unique collection of site-specific works by leading artists of our time. Click here to see more information about the collection, including a map showing how to take a self-guided tour.



SAN DIEGO INFORMATION
Weather
It is a good idea to bring a hat (for sun protection) and a light wrap or jacket for airconditioned rooms and for evenings.