Laura Albert is a Professor and is the David H. Gustafson Department Chair of Industrial & Systems Engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research focuses on discrete optimization with application to homeland security, emergency response, and cybersecurity. Professor Albert’s research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of the Army, and Sandia National Laboratory. She has authored or co-authored more than 70 publications in archival journals and refereed proceedings. She has been awarded many honors for her research, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Fellow Award, Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE) Fellow Award, the INFORMS Impact Prize, four publication awards, a National Science Foundation CAREER award, a Fulbright Award, and a Department of the Army Young Investigator Award. She is a Department Editor for IISE Transactions and is on or has been on six other journal Editorial Boards. Dr. Albert has served on the INFORMS Board as the Vice President for Marketing, Communication, and Outreach and served as the Assistant Dean for Graduate Affairs in the College of Engineering at UW-Madison. She is the author of the blog “Punk Rock Operations Research”. You can find her on twitter at @lauraalbertphd.