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Research and Projects

Sustainability Systems Analysis Lab conducts interdisciplinary research on industrial ecology, sustainable engineering, and operations research to answer three important questions:

How sustainable is a product?

How to design a sustainable product/process?

How to optimize a system to balance economic, social, and environmental considerations?

Ongoing Projects

Past Projects

Research Fields

Industrial Ecology

Industrial Ecology is a broad area that analyzes the interactions among industrial, human, and natural systems. Our group uses life cycle assessment, input-output analysis, and material flow analysis to understand how industrial activities influence the environment and what are alternative actions for reducing adverse environmental impacts.

Sustainable Engineering

Sustainable Engineering integrates sustainability into engineering system design and operation. Our groups use engineering process modeling, techno-economic analysis, and engineering design to help engineers, designers, and manufacturing companies develop products and processes that can meet the needs of human beings without compromising the natural environment.

Operations Research

Operations research combines optimization, simulation, and statistics to enhance decision making in a wide range of domains, such as energy systems, management science, transportation, and financial service. Our group uses advanced analytical methods to identify optimal solutions that can have a good balance among economic, environmental, and social objectives.