Picture this scenario: A novel infectious disease is sweeping through the world’s population, and health officials have only a day or two to stop its deadly spread. While this may sound like the plot of a movie thriller, health officials argue that an event of this kind could become a reality sometime in the near future.

Researchers at the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences (AAAS) annual meeting say that new drug-resistant infectious diseases are appearing more frequently and spreading faster than ever before. In order to best address the next outbreak, ISyE Professor Eva Lee presented a novel software program at AAAS called RealOpt. You can read about the program that sifts through massive amounts of data to better optimize decision-making during the event of an emergency scenario – especially in the case of a deadly outbreak here: http://fxn.ws/1j95QrL