Panos Pardalos is Distinguished Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Florida. He is also affiliated faculty member of the Computer Science Department, the Hellenic Studies Center, and the Biomedical Engineering Program. He is also the director of the Center for Applied Optimization.Dr. Pardalos obtained a PhD degree from the University of Minnesota in Computer and Information Sciences. Dr. Pardalos is a world leading expert in global and combinatorial optimization. He is the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Global Optimization, Journal of Optimization Letters, and Computational Management Science. In addition, he is the managing editor of several book series, and a member of the editorial board of several international journals. He is the author of 8 books and the editor of several books. He has written numerous articles and developed several well known software packages. His research is supported by National Science Foundation and other government organizations. His recent research interests include network design problems, optimization in telecommunications, e-commerce, data mining, biomedical applications, and massive computing.