Canan Gunes Corlu

Associate Professor, Administrative Sciences Coordinator, Supply Chain Management

Dr. Canan Gunes Corlu is an associate professor and the faculty coordinator for the Supply Chain Management programs at BU’s Metropolitan College. She has both face-to-face and online teaching experience, with courses in operations management and supply chain management. Dr. Corlu’s research focuses on data-driven decision-making in operations, supply chains, and service systems under uncertainty. Her work develops analytical and simulation-based decision-support tools that help organizations improve performance in complex and dynamic environments. Her early research examined stochastic simulation under input uncertainty, with an emphasis on building reliable simulation models when historical data are limited. She has since expanded her work to integrate simulation, optimization, and machine learning to study problems in supply chain management, transportation and logistics, and warehouse operations. More recently, her research has focused on the use of digital twins in supply chain management, where simulation, real-time data, and optimization models are combined to support monitoring, prediction, and operational decision making. She has also begun exploring the application of operations research and analytics to illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing supply chains, with the goal of developing analytical tools that support monitoring, enforcement, and sustainability-oriented policy decisions.

Corlu’s research has appeared in a variety of journals, including Operations Research, IISE Transactions, Computers & Industrial Engineering, the Journal of Simulation, the INFORMS Journal on Applied Analytics, and the International Journal of Production Research. Her work on the representation of input risk on inventory simulations was recognized by the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) Minority Issues Forum Best Paper Competition in 2017 and 2018.

A senior member of INFORMS since 2024, Corlu received the INFORMS Volunteer Service Award (2021) and the Outstanding Reviewer Award at the Winter Simulation Conference (2021). She is the recipient of the Committee on Underrepresented Minorities and Women (CUMW) Award from the INFORMS Simulation Society (2009) as well as the Chadwick Fellowship Award from Boston University Metropolitan College (2017, 2025).

Corlu is actively involved in professional service, including her current roles as publicity cochair for the INFORMS Winter Simulation Conference (2026) and I-Sim Subdivision Council Representative for INFORMS (2023 onward). She also serves as an ambassador for the Decision Science Alliance (2024 onward). Her past service includes elected leadership positions in the INFORMS Simulation Society and the Junior Faculty Interest Group, extensive session and track organization for the INFORMS Winter Simulation Conference and Annual Meeting, and mentoring and judging for INFORMS mentorship and competition programs. She also serves on the editorial boards of several leading journals, including the Journal of Simulation (as associate editor), the European Journal of Operational Research, and the Decision Sciences journal.

View Dr. Corlu’s Curriculum Vitae 2026.

View Dr. Corlu’s Google Scholar Page.

View the Decision Sciences Research Laboratory Website.

Research Interests

Courses

Scholarly Works

Select Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles

Baycik, O., C. G. Corlu, A. Pierson, and G. McDaniel. “Nations’ fight against illegal fishing: Research opportunities in operations research and management science.” Computers & Industrial Engineering 213, article 111756 (2026).

Ferrari, A., C. G Corlu, and G. Mangano. “Order sequencing in automated storage and retrieval systems: A neural network-assisted simulation-optimisation approach.” Computers & Industrial Engineering 210, article 111537 (2025).

Onggo, B. S., X. A. Martin, C. G. Corlu, J. Panadero, and A. A. Juan. “Stochastic capacitated dispersion problems in disaster preparedness for mass casualty incident.” Journal of Heuristics 31, no.3, article 31 (2025).

Maleyeff, J. and C. G. Corlu. “Practice summary: Henkel uses analytics to improve call center performance.” INFORMS Journal on Applied Analytics 54, no. 4 (2024): 357–364.

Ghorpade, T. and C. G. Corlu. “Simheuristic approach for the stochastic one commodity pick-up and delivery traveling salesman problem.” Journal of Simulation 17, no. 6 (2022): 688–708.

Martins, L., R. de la Torre, C. G. Corlu, A. A. Juan, and M. Masmoudi. “Ride-sharing in smart sustainable cities: Review, open challenges, and the need for agile optimisation.” Computers & Industrial Engineering 153, article 107080 (2021).

Onggo, B. S., C. G. Corlu, A. A. Juan, T. Monks, and R. de la Torre. “Combining enterprise data storage systems with symbiotic simula.tion systems for real-time decision-making.” Enterprise Information Systems 15, no. 2 (2020): 230–247.

Maleyeff, J., and C. G. Corlu. “Stickley Adhesives.” INFORMS Transactions on Education 21, no. 2 (2020): 101–107.

Corlu, C. G., A. Akcay, and W. Xie. “Stochastic simulation under input uncertainty: A review.” Operations Research Perspectives 7, article 100162 (2020).

Corlu, C. G., B. Biller, and S. Tayur. “Driving inventory system simulations with limited demand data: Insights from the newsvendor problem.” Journal of Simulation 13, no. 2 (2018): 152–162.

Corlu, C. G., B. Biller, and S. Tayur. “Demand fulfillment probability in a multi-item inventory system with limited historical data.” IISE Transactions 49, no. 12 (2017): 1087–1100. Finalist for INFORMS 2018 MIF (Minority Issues Forum) Best Paper Competition.

Akcay, A., and C. G. Corlu. “Simulation of inventory systems with unknown input models: A data-driven approach.” International Journal of Production Research 55, no. 19 (2017): 5826–5840. DOI: 10.1080/00207543.2017.1343503. Finalist for INFORMS 2017 MIF (Minority Issues Forum) Best Paper Competition.

Biller, B., and C. G. Corlu. “Copula-based multivariate input modeling.” Surveys in Operations Research and Management Science (incorporated into Computers & Operations Research) 17, no. 2 (2012): 69–84.

Biller, B., and C. G. Corlu. “Accounting for parameter uncertainty in large-scale stochastic simulations with correlated inputs.” Operations Research 59, no. 3 (2011): 661–673.

Select Peer-Reviewed Conference Proceedings

Corlu, C. G., B. Biller, E. Wolf, and E. Yucesan. “On the value of an offsite inventory storage location under catastrophic risk.” In Decision Sciences, edited by Juan, A.A., Faulin, J., Lopez-Lopez, D. DSA ISC 2024. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 14779 (Springer, Cham. 2024).

Ferrari, A. and C. G. Corlu. “Metamodel-based order picking for automated storage and retrieval systems.” In Proceedings of the 2024 Winter Simulation Conference. Piscataway, New Jersey: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2024): 1457–1468.

Onggo, S. B., X. Martin, C. G. Corlu, J. Panadero, and A. Juan. “Solving facility location problems for disaster response using simheuristics and survival analysis: A hybrid modeling approach.” In Proceedings of the 2022 Winter Simulation Conference. Piscataway, New Jersey: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2022): 1497–1508.

Corlu, C. G., C. Rosman, A. Perez, and B. Harris. “Maximizing demand fulfillment probability under Pareto-distributed demand.” In Proceedings of the 2022 Decision Sciences Institute Conference (2022).

Martins, L., M. Torres, E. Perez, C. G. Corlu, A. Juan, and J. Faulin. “Solving an urban ridesharing problem with stochastic traveling times: A simheuristic approach.” In Proceedings of the 2021 Winter Simulation Conference. Piscataway, New Jersey: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2021): 1–12.

Lu, Danqi, J. Maleyeff, and C. G. Corlu. “Knee optimization for queuing systems: A customized approach.” In Proceedings of the 51st Annual Conference of the Decision Sciences Institute (2021).

Corlu, C. G., J. Maleyeff, C. Yang, T. Ma, and Y. Shen. “Decision support system with simulation-based optimization for healthcare capacity planning.” In Proceedings of the Operational Research Society Simulation Workshop (2021): 277–286.

Ghorpade, T., and C. G. Corlu. “Selective pick-up and delivery traveling salesman problem: A simheuristics approach.” In Proceedings of the 2020 Winter Simulation Conference, Piscataway, New Jersey: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2020): 1468–1479.

Doddavaram, R., and C. G. Corlu. “Teaching risk analytics using R.” In Proceedings of the 2020 Winter Simulation Conference, Piscataway, New Jersey: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2020): 3272–3281.

Corlu, C. G., B. Biller, E. Wolf, and E. Yucesan. “Inventory management with disruption risk.” In Proceedings of the 2020 Winter Simulation Conference, Piscataway, New Jersey: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2020): 2625–2636.

Maleyeff, J., and C. G. Corlu. “Monte Carlo simulations to teach the effect of lean methods to improve business processes.” In Proceedings of the 2019 Winter Simulation Conference, Piscataway, New Jersey: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (2019): 3356–3367.

Select Book Chapters

Corlu, C. G., S. Onggo, J. Panadero, and D. Lopez-Lopez. “Simulation and stochastic optimization for decision-making under uncertainty.” Accepted for publication in Springer Handbook of Data Engineering, Part II: Data Analytics (in press).

Lopez-Lopez, D., J. A. Rodriguez-Serrano, and C. G. Corlu. 2024. “Descriptive analytics and data visualization.” Accepted for publication in Springer Handbook on Data Engineering, Part II: Data Analytics (in press).

Lopez-Lopez, D., C. G. Corlu, L. F. Martinez, and J. Torres-Prunonosa. “Bridging marketing and operations in omnichannel retail.” Chapter in Encylopedia of Artificial Intelligence in Marketing. Edited by Riadh Ladhari. Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland (2026): 1-13.

Biller, B., C. G. Corlu, and S. R. Biller. “Uncertainty quantification in digital twin simulations.” Chapter in Optimizing Supply Chains through Digital Twins: Navigating the Modern Landscape. Edited by Ghaith Rabadi and Bulent Soykan. Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland (2025): 163—194.

In the Media

“Tariffs hit science labs: Trump’s levies raise cost of supplies,” Nature (April 4, 2025).

“Supply chain under the catastrophe.,” IDA Magazine (2025).

“Illumina’s DNA sequencers hit with China import ban,” MedTechDive (March 6, 2025).

“Sticker shock: New U.S. tariffs could raise cost of research equipment and supplies,” Science (March 4, 2025).

“How Trump’s trade fight could impact the medtech industry,” MedTechDive (February 12, 2025).

“The Tariffs are (Maybe) Coming,” RunningInsight (January 14, 2025).

“Trump’s tariffs: How manufacturers can prepare Manufacturing,” Dive (November 12, 2024).

“Helene shuts down mines critical to semiconductor production,” WRAL News (2024).

“Baltimore bridge collapse could have ‘profound effect’ on supply chain,” NBC Boston (March 27, 2024).

Professional Service and Leadership

Elected leadership roles in the INFORMS Simulation Society and Junior Faculty Interest Group
Organizing committee member, track coordinator, and proceedings editor, INFORMS Winter Simulation Conference
Session organizer, session chair, and program committee member, INFORMS Annual Meeting and Winter Simulation Conference
Program committee service for Decision Sciences Alliance, ANNSIM, and Simulation Workshop conferences
Council Representative, INFORMS Simulation Society (I-SIM Subdivision)
Ambassador, Decision Sciences Alliance
Observer and coach, INFORMS Franz Edelman Award Competition
Judge for conference best paper awards and INFORMS student competitions
Mentor in INFORMS professional mentorship programs

Editorial Positions

Associate Editor, Journal of Simulation (2020–Present)
Editorial Board, European Journal of Operational Research (2025–Present)
Editorial Review Board, Decision Sciences (2021–Present)
Editorial Board Member, Journal of Business Analytics (2018–Present)
Guest Editor, Journal of Simulation, “Simulation Optimization” (2022)

Honors and Awards

Chadwick Fellowship Award, Metropolitan College, Boston University (2017, 2025)
Recipient of INFORMS Senior Membership (2024)
INFORMS Volunteer Service Award, INFORMS (2021)
INFORMS Winter Simulation Conference Outstanding Reviewer Award, INFORMS (2021)
Finalist in INFORMS Minority Issues Forum Best Paper Award (2017, 2018)

Faculty Q&A

What is your area of expertise?
My research is in the area of the design and analysis of stochastic computer simulations, with applications in several areas including finance, inventory management, agri-food supply chains, pharmaceutical supply chains, and bio-manufacturing. In today’s uncertain world, simulation is an indispensable tool that is widely used to model complex business problems. I specifically look at how uncertainty in the inputs for the computer simulations affects the decision-making process in the aforementioned industries.

What courses do you teach at MET?
I teach Operations Management: Business Process Fundamentals (MET AD 605), Global Supply Chains (MET AD 680), and Enterprise Risk Analytics (MET AD 616). I also supervise the Capstone Project for Supply Chain Management (MET AD 804).

Is there a particular project within the courses you teach that most interests your students? What is it and why?
One of the main topics covered in the Enterprise Risk Analytics course is how to build a simulation model of a business problem to gain deeper insights about the problem, as well as to identify risks associated with a particular decision made by the decision-maker. Students enjoy using simulation as a technique as it allows them to model a complex system without relying on assumptions.

In the Operations Management and Global Supply Chains courses, students enjoy the presentation of analytical methods in the context of forecasting, inventory management, capacity management, and waiting line management, among other topics. These methods are then reinforced with real-life case studies.

The common thing that interests students in all these three courses is the applicability of the material in their workplaces. Students often share with me how they are using what they are learning in their courses in their daily work.

What initially drew you to Boston University? How did you connect with BU MET?
I was looking for an organization that supports junior faculty members as they grow as researchers and teachers, and also one that would benefit from my specific area of expertise. What first drew me to MET was the opportunity to teach a course in the supply chain management graduate program. My conversations with the faculty proved to me that this would be the right place for me to grow as both a researcher and a teacher. Looking back, I am glad that I made the decision to join BU MET.

I was able to establish myself as a researcher with expertise in simulations with applications in several areas. As an instructor, I have had the opportunity to develop and teach several courses related to my area of expertise. I also had the privilege of developing BU MET’s Master of Science in Supply Chain Management program and contributing to the Master of Science in Applied Business Analytics program.

In your opinion, what are the distinguishing characteristics of BU MET’s graduate programs in supply chain management? What sets MET apart from the competition?
We give our students the flexibility to choose one of three concentrations based on the area of supply chain management that interests them most: Global Business, Logistics Management, or Analytics. No matter which concentration the student pursues, our first priority is to teach industry-relevant concepts in class. In fact, we have an industry advisory board that I consult with regularly to understand the trends in the market and to make sure that those trends are covered in our courses.

We also make sure that we allow enough time for hands-on exercises in our classes. Another priority of the program is to help our students position themselves in the job market. To this end, we host panel sessions and other career-related events that enable students to expand their networks and hear from industry experts about needs in the market. Last fall, students were invited to two career panel sessions: “Career Opportunities for Supply Chain Management Students” and “Career Opportunities in Pharmaceutical Supply Chains.”

Finally, our capstone course—one of the mandatory courses in the Supply Chain Management master’s program—gives our students an edge in the job market by allowing them to work on a real problem selected by either the students or by industry experts. In fact, this semester, one of our students is working with me and an industry expert in the analysis of the logistic approaches of a large Boston-area furniture company.

How do the concepts students learn in MET’s supply chain management graduate programs apply in practice?
We have a nice blend of theory and practical approaches in our courses. We teach our students what is relevant in the business world so that they can apply what they’ve learned in class immediately in their jobs. Most of my students (who are also working professionals) share with me that the material that we cover in class is useful and practical—this confirms that the concepts that we teach in class apply directly in practice.

Have you contributed to any research or publications recently? What was the essence of the project?
My recently published works illustrate how to simulate inventory systems with unknown input models and parameters. The two papers that resulted from this research were selected as finalists in the best paper competition of the INFORMS Minority Issues Forum.

Most recently, I have been expanding my work to agri-food supply chains and the bio-manufacturing industry by collaborating with a group of researchers in Spain, England, the Netherlands, and the U.S. More specifically, our paper in the area of agri-food supply chains integrates transportation and inventory decisions in an agri-food supply chain having stochastic customer demands and perishable items. Our goal is to design routes that will minimize the costs related to transportation, inventory, and food waste while adhering to inherent constraints in the problem. In a related study, we are working on understanding how stochastic inputs can affect the performance of different agri-food supply chain configurations.

Our work in bio-manufacturing industry aims to build a simulation model for the bio-manufacturing production process to support decision-making in this industry. This study is in collaboration with one of the largest animal health companies in the world. After validating the model with input from the company, our goal is to go deeper and study the effect of uncertainties in the inputs of the simulation on the decision-making process of the company.

As coordinator for BU MET’s supply chain management graduate programs, how do you see the curriculum evolving to stay current with industry trends?
There are a number of trends that we can observe in the area of supply chain management. One, there are myriad risks that exist in supply chains. With the globalization of supply chains, these risks are only increasing; two, lean operations, sustainable supply chains, and reverse logistics are gaining more importance than ever before; and three, businesses have been utilizing new digital technologies including cloud platforms, big data, analytics, and the Internet of Things (IoT). Companies are leveraging these approaches in their manufacturing processes, logistics processes, and for understanding their customers and competitors.

At BU MET, we revise our courses constantly to stay current with these recent trends in the area of supply chain management.

View all profiles