Rhonda Righter

Professor - Department Chair

Ph.D. UC Berkeley, 1986
Industrial Engineering & Operations Research

4143 Etcheverry Hall (Chair's Office)
(510) 643-8214

4187 Etcheverry Hall
(510) 643-0321
E-mail: rrighterieor.berkeley.edu

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Refer all queries to gradadm@ieor.berkeley.edu
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Personal Homepage: http://www.ieor.berkeley.edu/~rrighter

Photo by Peg Skorpinski
Professor Rhonda Righter is the Chair of the Department of Industrial Engineering and Operations Research at the University of California, Berkeley. >From 1987-2003 she taught at the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University. She received a PhD in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from UC Berkeley in 1986. Her primary research and teaching interests are in the general area of stochastic modeling and optimization, especially as applied to service, manufacturing, telecommunications, and grid computing systems. She is an associate editor for Queueing Systems, and the Journal of Scheduling. She formerly served on the editiorial boards of Management Science, Operations Research, and Operations Research Letters. She is the past (founding) Chair of the Applied Probability Society of INFORMS.
Research
  • Stochastic modeling and optimization, with applications to manufacturing, service operations, computer communications, and telecommunications.
Publications
  • "Staffing Decisions for Heterogeneous Workers," co-authored with H.-S. Ahn and J.G. Shanthikumar, Mathematical Methods of Operations Research, to appear, 2005.
  • "The Effect of Service Time Variability on Maximum Queue Lengths in Batch M/G/1 Queues," co-authored with M. Nuyens and G. Koole, Journal of Applied Probability, to appear, 2005.
  • "Multi-actor Markov Decision Processes," co-authored with H.-S. Ahn, Journal of Applied Probability, to appear, 2005.
  • "Bandwidth Allocation in a Wireless Broadcast System," co-authored with A. Celik and S. Nahmias, International Journal of Information Technology & Decision Making, vol. 2, pp. 629-640, 2003.
  • "Characterizing Losses During Busy Periods in Finite Buffer Systems," co-authored with E. Pek and C. Xia, Journal of Applied Probability, vol. 40, pp. 242-249, 2003.
  • "Optimal Maintenance and Operation of a System with Backup Components," Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 16, pp. 339-349, 2002.
  • "Scheduling in Multiclass Networks with Deterministic Service Times," Queueing Systems: Theory and Applications, vol. 41, pp. 305-320, 2002.
  • "Optimal Transmission Policies for Noisy Channels," co-authored with G. Koole and Z. Liu, Operations Research, vol. 49, pp. 892-899, 2001.
  • "The Impact of Cell Dropping Policies in ATM Nodes," co-authored with Z. Liu, Operations Research, vol. 41, pp. 66-78, 2001.
  • "Optimal Ordering of Operations in a Manufacturing Chain," co-authored with J. G. Shanthikumar, Operations Research Letters, vol. 29, pp. 115-122, 2001.
  • "A Stochastic Batching and Scheduling Problem," co-authored with G. Koole, Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 15, pp. 465-479, 2001.
  • "Optimal Parallel Processing of Random Task Graphs," co-authored with Z. Liu, Journal of Scheduling, vol. 4, pp. 139-156, 2001.
  • "Expulsion and Scheduling Control for Multiclass Queues with Heterogeneous Servers," Queueing Systems: Theory and Applications, vol. 34, pp. 289-300, 2000.
  • "Scheduling of an Input-Queued Switch to Achieve Maximal Throughput," co-authored with E. Altman and Z. Liu, Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 14, pp. 327-334, 2000.
  • "A Note on Losses in M/GI/1/n Queues," Journal of Applied Probability, vol. 36, pp. 1240-1243, 1999.
  • "A Brokered Market with Heterogeneous Suppliers and Consumers," Journal of Applied Probability, vol. 36, pp. 512-522, 1999.
  • "Scheduling Multiclass Input-Queued Switches," co-authored with Z. Liu, Journal of Scheduling, vol. 2, pp. 99-114, 1999.
  • "Optimal Load Balancing on Distributed Homogeneous Unreliable Processors," co-authored with Z. Liu, Operations Research, vol. 46, pp. 563-573, 1998.
  • "Multi-Class Production Systems with Setup Times," co-authored with J. G. Shanthikumar, Operations Research, vol. 46, pp. S146-S154, 1998.
  • "Independently Expiring Multiarmed Bandits," co-authored with J. G. Shanthikumar, Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 12, pp. 453-468, 1998.
  • "Optimal Control of Tandem Reentrant Queues," co-authored with G. Koole, Queueing Systems, Theory and Applications, vol. 28, pp. 337-347, 1998.
  • "Optimal Computer Disk Access," Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 12, pp. 211-220, 1998.
  • "Stochastic Scheduling for a Two-Machine Open Shop, " Journal of Applied Probability, vol. 34, pp.733-744, 1997.
  • "Generalized Johnson's Rule for Stochastic Assembly Systems," Naval Research Logistics, vol. 44, pp. 211-220, 1997.
  • "Optimal Scheduling on Parallel Processors with Precedence Constraints and General Costs," co-authored with Z. Liu, Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 11, pp. 79-93, 1997.
  • "Optimal Policies for Scheduling Repairs and Allocating Heterogeneous Servers," Journal of Applied Probability, vol. 33, pp. 536-547, 1996.
  • "Optimal Scheduling of Multiclass Stochastic Systems," Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 10, pp. 229-241, 1996.
  • "On the Order of Tandem Queues," co-authored with D. Cheng, Queueing Systems, Theory and Applications, vol. 21, pp. 143-160, 1995.
  • "The Optimality of LEPT in Parallel Machine Scheduling," co-authored with C.-S. Chang, Journal of Applied Probability, vol. 31, pp. 788-796, 1994.
  • "The Stochastic Optimality of SEPT in Parallel Machine Scheduling," co-authored with C.-S. Chang, A. Hordijk, and G. Weiss, Probability in the Engineering and Informational Sciences, vol. 8, pp. 179-188, 1994.