Vladimir Nikolaevich Burkov is a Russian control theorist and the author of more than four hundred publications on control problems, game theory, and combinatorial optimization. Laureate of State Prize of USSR, of Prize of Cabinet Council of USSR, he is an Honoured Scholar of the Russian Federation. Vladimir Burkov is a vice-president of Russian Project Management Association (SOVNET) (the Russian branch of International Project Management Association, IPMA), Member of Russian Academy of Natural Sciences. A professor at Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and Head of Laboratory at V.A. Trapeznikov Institute of Control Sciences of RAS, in the end of the 1960s he pioneered the theory of active systems (which was a Soviet version of the theory of mechanism design).

Vladimir Burkov
Vladimir Burkov
Born (1939-11-17) November 17, 1939 (age 84)
NationalityRussian
Academic career
InstitutionV.A. Trapeznikov Institute of Control Sciences of RAS
FieldGame theory, mechanism design, combinatorial optimization
Alma materMoscow Institute of Physics and Technology
Doctoral
advisor
Alexander Lerner
Doctoral
students
Dmitry Novikov
ContributionsTheory of Active Systems
AwardsState Prize of USSR
Honoured Scholar of the Russian Federation

Biography edit

Vladimir Burkov was born on November 17, 1939, in the city of Vologda. In 1963 he graduated from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT) and was employed by Institute of Automation and Remote Control (since the 1970s it is known as ICS RAS, V.A. Trapeznikov Institute of Control Sciences of RAS), where he earned his Candidate of Sciences degree in 1966, and became Doctor of Sciences in 1975. In 1981 he earned professorship at the Chair of Control Sciences at MIPT and since 1974 he works at ICS RAS as a Head of Laboratory 57 "Laboratory of active systems" (until 2019) and a senior research scientist.

Married to Elena Burkova, the couple has a daughter Irina, who also earned the doctoral degree for her contributions to control theory.

Contributions to combinatory optimization and project scheduling edit

Early academic interests of Vladimir Burkov were connected with applied problems of combinatorial optimization;[1][2][3] in the 1960s he contributed to the boom of project scheduling and network planning,[4][5] proposed novel models of resource allocation in organizations[6] and in technical systems,[7] solved several extremal graph problems.[8][9] In particular, Vladimir Burkov proposed a lower-bound estimate[10] of the project makespan in resource-constrained project scheduling problem re-invented in 1998 by A. Mingozzi et al.[11] Two books by Vladimir Burkov, "Network models and control problems"[12] and "Applied problems of graph theory" [13] put forward the problems being intensively studied until now.

Launching theory of active systems edit

Since late 1960s interests of Vladimir Burkov shift to the studies of specific nature of human being as a controlled object (an agent). In 1969 he pursued an idea of the "fairplay principle" (in Russian: принцип открытого управления): plans assigned to selfish agents by the optimal control mechanism must be coordinated with agents' goal functions. Under such an incentive-compatible mechanism, truthtelling is beneficial for agents.[14][15] The notion of incentive compatibility was independently proposed by Leonid Hurwitz,[16] and later was extended and elaborated by Allan Gibbard,[17] Roger Myerson,[18] and many other researchers. They pioneered the revelation principle, which opened a new era in the studies of economic institutions (mechanism design and contract theory); it was mentioned as the main achievement[19] in 2007s Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences won by L. Hurwitz, E. Maskin, and R. Myerson.

The fairplay principle became the foundation of the newly introduced theory of active systems (a version of mechanism design originated from USSR), which systematically studied control mechanisms in man-machine systems. In the 1970s the seminal books and articles[20][21][22][23][24] determined the directions of theory development for many decades to come (some books of the early 2010s are [25][26][27]).

Organizational and teaching activities edit

In 1973 V. Burkov headed the newly created division in the Institute of Automation and Remote Control called "the Sector of Business Games"; in 1974 it was re-organized into the Laboratory 57 "Theory and methods of business games" later renamed to "Laboratory of Active Systems". As of the end of 2016 its headcount is 28 employees including 15 Doctors of Sciences and 5 Candidates of Sciences. During the decades V. Burkov supervised dozens of thesis works.[28]

Famous followers edit

Professor Dmitry Novikov, corresponding member of Russian Academy of Sciences (since 2008), was elected a director of ICS RAS on October 17, 2016.

References edit

  1. ^ Burkov V.N., Lovetsky S.E. (Бурков В.Н., Ловецкий С.Е.) (1968). Combinatorics and technical progress (Комбинаторика и развитие техники) (in Russian). Moscow (Москва): Znaniye (Знание).{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  2. ^ Burkov V.N. (Бурков В.Н.); Lovetsky S.E. (Ловецкий С.Е.) (1968). "Solution techniques for extremal combinatorpal problems: a survey (Методы решения экстремальных задач комбинаторного типа (обзор) )". Automation and Remote Control (in Russian). 11.
  3. ^ Burkov V.N. (Бурков В.Н.); Rubinstein M.I. (Рубинштейн М.И.) (1977). Combinatorial programming (Комбинаторное программирование). Moscow (Москва): Znaniye (Знание).
  4. ^ Burkov, V.N. (1969). "Optimal project control". In Proc. If 4th IFAC Congress. 46. Warszawa.
  5. ^ Burkov, V. N.; Moiseenko, G. Ye. (1969). "Problems of analysis and optimization of complexes of operations during registering transferences of resources". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 12: 86–93. Zbl 0274.90062 – via ZentralMATH.
  6. ^ Burkov, V.N. (1966). "Resources allocation as a time optimal problem". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 7: 119–129 – via MathNet.
  7. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Sokolov, V.B. (1969). "Optimal information allocation in the magnetic tape memory for bidirectional search". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 4: 107–117 – via ZentralMATH.
  8. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Lovetskiĭ, S.E. (1965). "Maximal flow through a generalized transport network". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 26 (12): 2163–2169 – via MathSciNet.
  9. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Groppen, V.O. (1974). "Solving the problem of minimal cut on a bi-connected orgraph by the branch-and-bound method". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 9: 104–110 – via MathNet.
  10. ^ Burkov, V.N. (1972). "Problems of optimum distribution of resources". Control and Cybernetics. 1 (1–2): 27–41 – via mtas.ru.
  11. ^ Mingozzi A., Maniezzo V., Ricciardelli S., Bianco L. (1998). "An exact algorithm for project scheduling with resource constraints based on new mathematical formulation". Management Science. 44 (5): 714–729. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.49.7550. doi:10.1287/mnsc.44.5.714 – via ACM.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  12. ^ Burkov V.N., Landa B.D., Lovetsky S.E., Teiman A.I. (Бурков В.Н., Ланда Б.Д., Ловецкий С.Е., Тейман А.И.) (1967). Networks Models and Control Problems (Сетевые модели и задачи управления) (in Russian). Moscow (Москва): Sovetskoye Radio (Советское радио).{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  13. ^ Burkov V.N., Gorgidze I.A., Lovetsky S.E. (Бурков В.Н., Горгидзе И.А., Ловецкий С.Е.) (1974). Applied problems of graph theory (Прикладные задачи теории графов). Tbilisi (Тбилиси): Metsniereba (Мецниереба).{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  14. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Lerner, A.Ya. (1970). "Open control principle for active systems". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 8: 100–111. Zbl 0218.93003 – via ZentralMATH.
  15. ^ Burkov V.N., Lerner A.Ya. (1971). Fairplay in control of active systems (Differential games and related topics ed.). Amsterdam, London: North-Holland Publishing Company. pp. 164–168. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |agency= ignored (help)
  16. ^ Hurwicz L. (1972). On informationally decentralized systems (Decision and Organization: a Volume in Honor of Jacob Marshak ed.). Amsterdam, London: North-Holland Publishing Company. pp. 297–336. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |agency= ignored (help)
  17. ^ Gibbard, Allan (1973). "Manipulation of voting schemes: A general result". Econometrica. 41 (4): 587–601. doi:10.2307/1914083. JSTOR 1914083.
  18. ^ Myerson, Roger (1979). "Incentive compatibility and the bargaining problem". Econometrica. 47 (1): 61–74. doi:10.2307/1912346. JSTOR 1912346 – via EconPaper.
  19. ^ Compiled by the Prize Committee of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. "Mechanism Design Theory: Scientific background on the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2007" (PDF).
  20. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Kondrat'yev, V.V. (1977). "Two-level active systems. I. Basic notions and definitions". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 7: 62–70 – via MathSciNet.
  21. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Kondrat'yev, V.V. (1977). "Two-level active systems. II. Analysis and synthesis of functioning mechanisms". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 7: 62–70 – via MathSciNet.
  22. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Kondrat'yev, V.V. (1977). "Two-level active systems. III. Equilibria in above-board control laws". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 9: 83–91 – via MathSciNet.
  23. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Enaleev, A.K.; Kondrat'yev, V.V. (1980). "Two-level active systems. IV. Price of decentralizing functioning mechanisms". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 6: 110–117 – via MathNet.
  24. ^ Burkov, V.N.; Enaleev, A.K.; Kondrat'yev, V.V.; Tsvetkov, A.V. (1983). "Elements of the theory of optimal design for functioning mechanisms of two-level active systems. I". Avtomatika i Telemekhanika. 10: 139–143. Zbl 0542.90046 – via ZentralMATH.
  25. ^ Burkov V., Goubko M., Kondrat’ev V., Korgin N., Novikov D. (2013). Mechanism Design and Management: Mathematical Methods for Smart Organizations (for managers, academics and students). New York: Nova Publishers.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  26. ^ Novikov D. (2013). Theory of Control in Organizations. New York: Nova Science Publishers. p. 341. ISBN 978-1624177941.
  27. ^ Burkov V. N., Goubko M., Korgin N., Novikov D. (2015). Introduction to Theory of Control in Organizations. Boca Raton: CRC Press.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  28. ^ "Interactive tree of the Theory of Active Systems".