Zelda Barbara Zabinsky is an

industrial engineer Industrial engineering is an engineering profession that is concerned with the optimization of complex processes, systems, or organizations by developing, improving and implementing integrated systems of people, money, knowledge, information a ...

and

operations research Operations research ( en-GB, operational research) (U.S. Air Force Specialty Code: Operations Analysis), often shortened to the initialism OR, is a discipline that deals with the development and application of analytical methods to improve deci ...

er specializing in the application of

global optimization Global optimization is a branch of applied mathematics and numerical analysis that attempts to find the global minima or maxima of a function or a set of functions on a given set. It is usually described as a minimization problem because the max ...

logistics Logistics is generally the detailed organization and implementation of a complex operation. In a general business sense, logistics manages the flow of goods between the point of origin and the point of consumption to meet the requirements of ...

. She is a professor of industrial engineering at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattle a ...

, where she also holds adjunct positions in electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, and civil and environmental engineering.

Education and career

Zabinsky did her undergraduate studies at the

University of Puget Sound The University of Puget Sound (UPS or Puget Sound) is a private university in Tacoma, Washington. The university draws approximately 2,600 students from 44 states and 16 countries. It offers 1,200 courses each year in more than 50 traditional an ...

, majoring in mathematics with a minor in biology. Her interests from this time include optimization of transportation as well as

predator-prey dynamics Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common List of feeding behaviours, feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (wh ...

. After graduating, she worked at the

National Marine Fisheries Service The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), informally known as NOAA Fisheries, is a United States federal agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that is responsible for the stew ...

and

Boeing The Boeing Company () is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, telecommunications equipment, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product ...

before following her husband to

Ann Arbor, Michigan Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County, Michigan, Washtenaw County. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851. It is the principal city of the Ann Arbor ...

, where she worked on applications of operations of research to health care at Vector Research, now part of the Altarum Institute. She completed her Ph.D. in industrial and operations engineering at the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

. Her 1985 dissertation, ''Computational Complexity of Adaptive Algorithms in Monte Carlo Optimization'', was supervised by Robert L. Smith. She joined the University of Washington faculty in 1985.

Book

Zabinsky is the author of the book ''Stochastic Adaptive Search in Global Optimization'' (Kluwer, 2004).

Recognition

Zabinsky is a

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

of the

Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers The Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE), formerly the Institute of Industrial Engineers, is a professional society dedicated solely to the support of the industrial engineering profession and individuals involved with improving q ...

, elected in 2009. She was elected to the 2019 class of Fellows of the

Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is an international society for practitioners in the fields of operations research (O.R.), management science, and analytics. It was established in 1995 with the merger of ...

, for "fundamental contributions in developing theory and algorithms for global optimization, with significant applications in engineering design, health care, and numerous other fields, and substantial impacts in education and service".

References

External links

Home page
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Women in STEM: Ep. 8 Math House
interview with Zabinsky on encouraging children to follow STEM careers {{DEFAULTSORT:Zabinsky, Zelda Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American industrial engineers American women engineers Operations researchers University of Puget Sound alumni University of Michigan alumni University of Washington faculty Fellows of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences 20th-century American engineers 20th-century women engineers 21st-century American engineers 21st-century women engineers 20th-century American women American women academics 21st-century American women