Network Design for Strategic Environments

The primary objective of this project is to explore fundamental questions in network design through an interdisciplinary lens. In this context, we assume that network stakeholders are strategic and self-interested entities. To address these questions, we employ existing tools from algorithmic game theory, a field at the intersection of theoretical computer science, economics and operations research, and at the same time develop new algorithms and methodologies. 

The project focuses on three main directions:

1. Investigating strategic network design problems exhibiting combinatorial structures that go beyond matroids; such settings are known to be particularly challenging.
2. Developing budget-feasible mechanisms for network design problems; in this context, we hope to settle a fundamental problem that is open since more than 10 years.
3. Exploring mechanism design and algorithmic aspects that go beyond worst-case analysis; in particular, we explore the new paradigm of learning-augmented mechanism design.