Dimitris Bertsimas on AI, Optimization, and Democratizing Education

Dimitris Bertsimas, the Boeing Leaders for Global Operations Professor of Management at MIT Sloan and vice provost for open learning, delivered the 54th annual James R. Killian Faculty Achievement Award Lecture on March 19, 2026, to an audience of over 300 MIT community members in Huntington Hall. His lecture, titled "Algorithms for Life: AI and Operations Research Transforming Healthcare, Education, and Agriculture," showcased how operations research has evolved from optimizing business logistics to addressing critical challenges in healthcare and education.

Bertsimas began by reflecting on his four-decade career at MIT, where he has become one of the Institute's most influential operations research scholars. His work spans optimization theory, stochastic processes, and practical applications that have touched millions of lives. "I have tried to improve the human condition," Bertsimas told the audience, summarizing the breadth of his research and its real-world impact.

One of Bertsimas's most significant contributions has been the development of "robust optimization" in the early 2000s. This approach addresses a fundamental challenge in optimization: finding solutions that work reliably under uncertainty rather than achieving theoretical perfection that fails in practice. As Bertsimas explained, when optimizing ship traffic through the Panama Canal, some approaches aimed for 48 vessels per day but encountered significant problems. His robust optimization approach identified that 45 vessels per day was better—a slightly lower number that "was always feasible." This principle has since been applied to everything from international business logistics to the allocation of school buses in Boston.

A personal tragedy in 2009—the deaths of both his parents—propelled Bertsimas to focus more intensively on healthcare applications. Working with Hartford HealthCare in Connecticut, his team has developed tools that reduce the average hospital stay from 5.38 days to 4.93 days. In the main Hartford hospital they studied, this reduction has enabled more than 5,000 additional patient stays per year, given the number of existing beds. "It's a very different ballgame," Bertsimas noted, highlighting how operations research can directly improve patient care and hospital efficiency.

Bertsimas's current work increasingly incorporates artificial intelligence into operations research. His team is developing AI-powered diagnostic tools and optimization algorithms that can handle the complexity and uncertainty inherent in healthcare settings. This represents a natural evolution of his research, combining traditional operations research methods with modern machine learning techniques.

Beyond his research contributions, Bertsimas is renowned as an educator who has supervised 106 PhD students and counting. "It is far and away my favorite activity, to supervise my doctoral students," he said. "It is a privilege, in my opinion, to work with exceptional young people like the ones we have at MIT, in ability and character and aspiration. They actually make me a better scientist, and a better person."

As vice provost for open learning, Bertsimas is now focused on democratizing access to education. He has personally developed a large online course called "The Analytics Edge" and aspires for MIT to reach a billion learners through online education. During the lecture, he demonstrated AI tools his team is developing for online education, including ways to condense material and translate content into other languages. These tools aim to make high-quality education accessible to learners worldwide, regardless of their location or resources.

Bertsimas's journey to MIT began with a BS in electrical engineering and computer science from the National Technical University of Athens in Greece, followed by MS and PhD degrees in operations research and applied mathematics from MIT. He joined the MIT faculty immediately after completing his doctorate and has remained at the Institute ever since, becoming the only faculty member on campus with "MIT" in his first name in order.

Roger Levy, chair of the MIT faculty, introduced Bertsimas by noting that his "scholarly contributions are both extensive and groundbreaking." Levy emphasized that Bertsimas is "one of the rare individuals who has made significant contributions to both intellectual threads in the field of operations research: one, optimization—combinatorial, linear, and nonlinear—and number two, stochastic processes."

The Killian Award, established in 1971 to honor James Killian, MIT's 10th president, represents the highest honor the Institute bestows upon its faculty. Bertsimas's selection reflects not only his technical contributions but also his commitment to education and his vision for using technology to address global challenges.

As Bertsimas concluded his lecture, he returned to the theme that has guided his career: understanding how the world works and developing tools to help us navigate it. "I try to increase the human understanding of how the world works," he said, encapsulating a career dedicated to both theoretical advancement and practical application. His work demonstrates how operations research, enhanced by artificial intelligence, can transform everything from hospital operations to global education, making complex systems more efficient, reliable, and accessible to all.

For those interested in learning more about Bertsimas's work, his online course "The Analytics Edge" provides an introduction to the field, while his research papers and collaborations with healthcare institutions showcase the practical applications of operations research in addressing real-world challenges.