Barry Nelson - Purdue Distinguished Engineering Alumni/Alumnae - Purdue University

Barry Nelson

Walter P. Murphy Professor Emeritus, Industrial Engineering & Management Sciences, Northwestern University
MSIE ‘81, PhD IE ‘83

When Barry Nelson was a graduate student from 1979 to 1984, Purdue Industrial Engineering was the center of the computer simulation universe. Fast forward four decades, and Nelson is widely regarded as the most respected and accomplished academic in the field of computer simulation of scholastic systems.

“Not only did IE offer an unheard of three graduate-level courses in simulation, but nearly every internationally known scholar in simulation visited Purdue IE for a seminar or sabbatical while I was there,” Nelson said.

With an undergraduate background in math and computer science, he didn’t immediately appreciate the great opportunity at Purdue and, out of frustration, he almost quit after his first semester. But everything changed in his second semester.

“I took IE 580 system simulation from — unknown to me — the famous Dr. Alan Pritsker (1933-2000), and I was also selected for a large project to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease among U.S. Air Force pilots. By the end of the semester, I was all in on IE and Purdue and never looked back.” Coming full circle, he was invited to present the Edwardson School of Industrial Engineering’s Alan B. Pritsker Scholars Distinguished Lecture in 2018, and he earned an Outstanding Industrial Engineering Award in 2014 from the university.

Through his PhD work under Bruce Schmeiser, now a Purdue professor emeritus, Nelson “learned the importance of digging through all relevant literature and the power and beauty of a rigorous mathematical representation, while still keeping the engineering problem behind the research in mind. These experiences formed the foundation of my 40-year research program.”

He spent 11 years on the faculty of The Ohio State University before heading into a 28-year, highly accomplished career at Northwestern University, where he is now the Walter P. Murphy Professor emeritus. He has helped scores of students, companies, and software developers understand, model, explain, and mitigate risk in industrial and service systems, and many of his products have been adopted by commercial software companies. In retirement, he is a part-time consultant for Sunairio Inc., and he remains active in research and book writing.

Nelson is one a small number of individuals who is a fellow of both the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) and the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE). He is a four-time recipient of the INFORMS Simulation Society Best Simulation Publication Award, and in 2022, the society honored him with a Lifetime Professional Achievement Award. In addition, he is a three-time winner of the IISE Transactions Best Paper Award in operations, and the organization in 2019 bestowed upon him its top honor, the 2019 David F. Baker Distinguished Research Award. He has published three books and 200+ research papers with more than 14,622 citations — considered exceptionally high for the operations research and industrial engineering disciplines. He also has delivered plenary talks and lectures all over the world, including the keynote for INFORMS’ 50th Anniversary Winter Simulation Conference in 2017.

Nelson mentored 34 PhD students and two postdoctoral researchers, 26 of whom went on to academic careers. “Mentoring students is the most personal type of teaching, and I continue to enjoy watching them build on our work together and take it in new and exciting directions,” he said.

Career Highlights

Education