Pranav Nuti

About

I work on resource allocation problems inspired by applications such as rental marketplaces, ride-sharing, and matching people with housing. Mathematical models for these problems have often overlooked important practical challenges such as uncertain demand, reusable capacity, costly cancellations, unannounced abandonment, and limited data. I aim to identify these gaps, model resource allocation problems more realistically, and develop simple yet provably optimal algorithms for solving them. Most recently, I have begun exploring how AI pipelines can accelerate research, complementing human intuition, judgment, and expertise. Alongside research, I have a strong interest in teaching and mentoring students.

What's New

• I am a finalist for the Michael H. Rothkopf Junior Researcher Paper Prize for my paper Stationary Online Contention Resolution Schemes and Applications to Reusable Resource Allocation!
• I was invited to give a talk on Solving Open Problems in Operations Research Using AI at the Analytics for X 2026 conference.
• A new paper, Single-Sample Prophet Inequalities for Knapsack Problems, with a simple and elegant algorithm is now available!
• We launched Open Problems in Operations Research, a public database of problems, literature reviews, and AI-assisted progress! Our work was presented as a poster at Can AI do Theory? at STOC 2026, and our draft paper, Solving Open Problems in Operations Research Using AI, will be presented at AI-Driven Research in EconCS at EC 2026.
• I was invited to give a talk on How to write and review papers as part of the EC 2026 mentoring workshop.
• Three short papers, Bounded Best Buyers: Prophet Inequalities Revisited, Magicians Don't Move: An Easy Peasy OCRS, and A Match Made by Entropy, were accepted to Easy Peasy at EC 2026, a workshop for elegant proofs and results in algorithmic game theory. These papers are based on Prophet Inequalities with Cancellation Costs and Stationary Online Contention Resolution Schemes.

Upcoming Conferences

• 62nd Allerton Conference on Communication, Control, and Computing, Urbana, IL, September 15-18, 2026. On Friday, September 18, from 8:30-10:10 AM, I will give a talk on Stationary Online Contention Resolution Schemes and Applications to Reusable Resource Allocation.
• 2026 INFORMS Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA, November 1-4, 2026. I will be presenting my job market paper, Stationary Online Contention Resolution Schemes and Applications to Reusable Resource Allocation, at three sessions:
  • SC01: Selected Auctions and Market Design Papers from the EC 2026 Conference II (Award Session, Auctions and Market Design Section): Sunday, November 1, 1:15-2:30 PM, Moscone South-50 (Lower Mezz).
  • SE01: Michael H. Rothkopf Junior Researcher Paper Prize (Award Session, Auctions and Market Design Section): Sunday, November 1, 4:15-5:30 PM, Moscone South-50 (Lower Mezz).
  • TD45: Market and Mechanism Design with Learning and AI (Invited Session, Revenue Management Section): Tuesday, November 3, 2:45-4:00 PM, Moscone South-307 (Level 3).

Papers

Journal Publications and Revisions

1. Stationary Online Contention Resolution Schemes. With Mohammad Reza Aminian and Rad Niazadeh. Operations Research, major revision. Conference version: EC 2026. Finalist for the Michael H. Rothkopf Junior Researcher Paper Prize.
2. Prophet Inequalities with Cancellation Costs. With Farbod Ekbatani, Rad Niazadeh, and Jan Vondrak. Operations Research, minor revision. Conference versions: STOC 2024, EC 2026.
3. Online Matching and Contention Resolution for Edge Arrivals with Vanishing Probabilities. With Will Ma and Calum MacRury. Operations Research, minor revision. Conference version: EC 2024.
4. Toward an Optimal Contention Resolution Scheme for Matchings. With Jan Vondrak. Mathematical Programming, 2025. Conference version: IPCO 2023. arXiv version.
5. Engaging Activities for Teaching Linear Algebra. With Shintaro Fushida-Hardy and Megan Selbach-Allen. PRIMUS, 2024.
6. The Secretary Problem with Distributions. Mathematics of Operations Research, major revision. Conference version: IPCO 2022.

Conference Papers

1. Static Pricing for Single Sample Multi-unit Prophet Inequalities. With Peter Westbrook. SOSA 2026. arXiv version.
2. Secretary Problems: The Power of a Single Sample. With Jan Vondrak. SODA 2023. arXiv version.
3. A Tight Competitive Ratio for Online Submodular Welfare Maximization. With Amit Ganz and Roy Schwartz. ESA 2023. arXiv version.

Submitted Papers

1. Prophet Inequalities and Contention Resolution for Matchoids. With Calum MacRury and Jan Vondrak.
2. Single-Sample Prophet Inequalities for Knapsack Problems. With Rebecca Reiffenhäuser and Alice Sayutina.
3. Optimal Bayesian Online Allocation of Reusable Resources. With Mohammad Reza Aminian and Rad Niazadeh.

Workshop Papers

1. Solving Open Problems in Operations Research Using AI. With Eric Fithian and Rad Niazadeh. Draft paper. AI-Driven Research in EconCS at EC 2026. Based on Open Problems in Operations Research. Also presented as a poster at Can AI do Theory? at STOC 2026 and as a poster at Learning-driven Algorithms and Machine-aided Proofs (LAMP).
2. Bounded Best Buyers: Prophet Inequalities Revisited. With Farbod Ekbatani, Rad Niazadeh, and Jan Vondrak. Easy Peasy at EC 2026. Based on Prophet Inequalities with Cancellation Costs.
3. Magicians Don't Move: An Easy Peasy OCRS. With Mohammad Reza Aminian and Rad Niazadeh. Easy Peasy at EC 2026. Based on Stationary Online Contention Resolution Schemes.
4. A Match Made by Entropy. With Mohammad Reza Aminian and Rad Niazadeh. Easy Peasy at EC 2026. Based on Stationary Online Contention Resolution Schemes.

Awards

• Polya Teaching Fellow Award (2024).
• Robert Osserman Teaching Award (2022).
• Hoefer Mentoring Award (2022).

Teaching and Mentoring

Teaching

1. Linear Algebra, Stanford Summer Engineering Academy. Instructor, 2021-2022. Course materials.
2. Stanford Jail and Prison Education Project (SJPEP). Instructor, 2023.

Mentoring

1. Stanford Undergraduate Research in Mathematics (SURIM). 2023. Mentees: Ethan Zhang, Ezra Steinberg, Peter Westbrook, Quinn McIntyre. Student report.
2. Directed Reading Program, Stanford Mathematics. 2020-2022, 2024. Mentees: Alessandra Maranca, Sophia Sanchez, Ellen Xu, Donald Poindexter, Logan Bhamidipaty, Sohan Vichare.
3. Stanford Summer Engineering Academy. 2023. Mentees: Talia Blum, Zhihan Li.
4. TA Mentoring Program, Stanford Mathematics. 2022-2023. Mentees: Yosheb Getachew, Joao Campos Vargas, Zhenyuan Zhang, Hongjian Yang.
5. Alex Huang. Research mentee, 2025.