An expert in optimization, Karmel S. Shehadeh focuses on how to make good decisions when key conditions—like demand, travel times, or system performance—are constantly changing. (Image/Midjourney)
Karmel S. Shehadeh, WiSE Gabilan assistant professor at USC Viterbi School of Engineering’s Daniel J. Epstein Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, has received a highly competitive grant from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR).
The three-year, nearly $400,000 award will fund her project, “Advancing Contextual Stochastic Optimization via Distributionally Robust Optimization Techniques,” aimed at improving decision-making under uncertainty. The AFOSR program is widely considered one of the most prestigious sources of federal funding in engineering and applied mathematics.
“I’m very happy and grateful for the Air Force for supporting this research,” she said. “It’s a single investigator award, which shows they believe in the impact of the idea and its potential to advance the field.”
Making better decisions
Shehadeh’s work focuses on a challenge that touches nearly every part of modern life: how to make good decisions when key conditions—like demand, travel times, or system performance—are constantly changing.
Additionally, many real-world problems involve uncertainty that depends on the decisions themselves. For example, traffic conditions depend on routing choices, and hospital demand can shift based on policy and operational decisions. At the same time, decision-makers often have limited or imperfect data, making it difficult to fully understand or predict these decision-dependent uncertainties. Overlooking these dynamics can also result in inefficient—or even flawed—decisions.
Karmel S. Shehadeh (Photo/Courtesy of Karmel S. Shehadeh)
Shehadeh’s research addresses this challenge by developing data-driven optimization tools that combine machine learning with distributionally robust optimization. By incorporating contextual information—such as weather, demand trends, or real-time traffic conditions—these tools help decision-makers better account for uncertainty and adapt to changing environments. Rather than trying to eliminate uncertainty, her approach embraces it, leading to more dynamic, robust, and adaptable decisions.
The potential impact spans multiple sectors. In healthcare, her work can help hospitals better schedule doctors and allocate resources. In transportation, it can improve routing decisions and reduce congestion and delays. In logistics, it can guide where to place facilities or how to move goods efficiently across supply chains.
“This is a general framework that can be applied to many important problems,” she said.
The same ideas also have clear implications for national defense. The Department of Defense faces complex planning and operational challenges that depend on uncertain and evolving information, from supply chains to logistics to network security. Tools that better account for ambiguity can support more effective resource allocation, strengthen mission planning, improve operational readiness, and enable more reliable, efficient and resilient systems.
A love of teaching, mentoring and research
Shehadeh joined USC in 2025 after previously serving on the faculty at Lehigh University and completing a postdoctoral fellowship at Carnegie Mellon University. She said she was drawn to USC by the strength of the Viterbi School of Engineering and the opportunity to collaborate across disciplines.
She also values the chance to teach and mentor students. Above all, however, Shehadeh enjoys tackling complex, meaningful problems.
“I’m really in love with research,” she said. “For me, it’s like a video game: you finish one level, and then you want to move on to the next and take on a new challenge.”
Published on April 29th, 2026
Last updated on April 29th, 2026